





L * 

<. 

^ 









s , 













v **' 




^' 









,0 <o 






.^ -*> 






*s ^ <%■ >; 



y- ' - aV -/> 



\^ ^ 



" ^ v 



./ ^r.v'q 



\0 o* 



> 



^ 0° 



\^ 



o>' 



^ "* 



V ,V X 
















A° *" 



, o o x 



c i. 




':. 



> 



A' cP 



\^\ s 


v M 




•# % 






•# 



^ V* 



^o, 













A N c° K S 



^ "% 






->. 







d> *" o M 



%c ^" = ^ .#' 




. 












A b 



<0 c> 



o s 








W v 



e**V ' *V ^ 



- - 



Wf & 



■\y 



-^. 









■ f "V 



.:. 



^J 






o 



A" 



* S? 






% ^ 

A 






■ = -T-. : V: 



w 




Life and Labors 

of 

Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 



The Great 
Modern Evangelist 



With Selected Sermons 



Herman, Poole & Co., Publishers 

Decatur, 111. 

1908 






JlSrARY of O 

jj -.WO (J05I6S - - 

5 MAY 11 1^08 



," / * ? S 6 6 



Copyright, 1908, 

BY 

S. T. Herman and E. E. Poole. 



Ale Rights Reserved 



INTRODUCTION 



Rev. William A. Sunday, or Billy Sunday, as he is 
more commonly and familiarly known, was born at 
Storey, Iowa, in November, 1863, to a widowed 
mother; his father, a Union soldier of the Twenty- 
third Iowa Regiment, having been offered as a patri- 
otic sacrifice to his country on the battle-field a short 
time before the subject of this sketch first saw the light 
of day. The patriotism of the surviving heroes of 
the Great Civil War which cost the life of the heroic 
father provided the posthumous son with shelter and 
nurture in the Iowa Soldiers' Orphans' Home. He 
was then a rugged, hale and hearty little fellow, the 
undisputed heir to his heroic father's patriotism and 
manly qualities and virtues. We must presume that 
at an early age, with unforgetting regret, he learned of 
his first great early loss, a father's touch and smile, a 
father's love and sympathy and care, unknown to him. 
This great sorrow pressed hard upon his childish heart 
for that "father whom never having seen he loved." 

His early life, while uneventful aside from the trying 
ordeals, hardships and drudgery which too often ac- 
company like circumstances, seems to have been some- 
what strenuous. Hard work and rough knocks became 
his daily program, and early did he learn that "man 
must earn his daily bread by the sweat of his brow." 
At the age of fourteen years he applied for, and was 
surprised to receive, the appointment as janitor of a 



8 Introduction 

large school, where his duties required him to build 
and keep up fourteen fires during the day and sweep 
out the rooms after school. For his services he re- 
ceived twenty-five dollars a month, which he used to 
pay his way through school and procure an education. 
He worked his way through and thus maintained his 
independence. His intellectual soul craved and hun- 
gered for instruction, knowledge and wisdom con- 
cerning art, science, literature, history and all the mys- 
terious nature he beheld unfolding around about him. 
This same self-reliant, independent and investigating 
spirit still shows itself in the life, character, conduct 
and preaching of the great evangelist. 

While quite young he was apprenticed to State 
Senator John Scott of Iowa, to learn the furniture 
business, with whom he remained for some time. He 
seems to have cherished a warm spot in his heart for 
the senator, to whom he refers as one of the best 
friends that a poor homeless boy ever found. 

It was while he was with Senator Scott that he 
attracted the attention of Captain Anson of the White 
Sox, whose trained eye and judgment recognized in 
the quick-motioned, sturdy, athletic young furniture 
salesman, and future great evangelist, just the mate- 
rial for the great base ball team which was destined 
never to be excelled in the annals of the history of 
the national game. After some negotiations with Cap- 
tain Anson, he went to Chicago and became a member 
of the team, playing with them for five years, and, 
with the team, making a remarkable national reputa- 
tion. He became one of the most popular ball players 
in the United States. 

The ordinary young man, in his early twenties, with 
a princely salary rivaling that of a United States sen- 



Introduction 9 

ator, riding the top wave of popular acclaim, highly 
elated with the most satisfactory success possible in his 
line, would likely have been carried off his feet by the 
plaudits, flattery and demonstrations of the people, 
given himself up a victim to riotous or extravagant 
living, and in time been lost in the oblivion of the re- 
cent past which has dimmed or swallowed up the fame 
of the great gladiators of the diamond. Not so with 
this earnest, level-headed young man who was des- 
tined to become one of the world's greatest evangel- 
ists. We can not give in detail the trials and tribu- 
lations which he encountered about this time, but 
through that great influence which those who have 
known may understand, he became the subject of a 
great mental, moral, conscientious and religious awak- 
ening, and thenceforward a Christian soldier, with 
the full determination to fight with all the strength 
of his nature, being and faith for the salvation of souls, 
the greatest cause of humanity, for which Christ died. 

Mr. Sunday has always been remarkably charitable 
and benevolent, a free giver to the Y. M. C. A., and 
other religious and worthy causes. Among his liberal 
and kind-hearted acts may be mentioned the tuition 
of a number of young men in school whom he is edu- 
cating and fitting to carry on the great battle against 
sin and the devil; young men who may take up and 
continue the great work of God and humanity, when 
the great evangelist, tired and worn out from cease- 
less toil and strenuous life, must fall as did his noble 
sire, a martyr to the cause for which he fought. 

There has been much discussion as to what qualities 
or elements in his character as a minister and evangel- 
ist have brought him into so great popularity and 
given him the unsurpassed and most remarkable sue- 



io Introduction 

cess which he has attained in saving souls. With that 
question still unsettled, we herewith submit to the 
public the following synopses of the principal sermons 
of one of the world's most remarkable and popular 
evangelists, for perusal and consideration, believing 
that the wisest and best will find entertainment and 
food for reflection. 

THE PUBLISHERS. 



LIFE AND LABORS OF 

REV. WM. A. (BILLY) SUNDAY 

THE GREAT MODERN EVANGELIST 



With Selected Sermons 



If any man will do his will, he shall know 
of the doctrine whether it be of God or whether 
I speak of myself. — John 7 :17. 

"I have always had sympathy with a man who has trouble 
intellectually, and if I can assist him in any way I shall be glad to 
do it and to lead you to a clear conception of your duty toward 
God and your fellow man. They said to Jesus, 'How do we know 
that you are what you claim to be?' He replied and said, 'If you 
will do God's will, then you will know whether I am or not.' If 
you want to know whether there is anything like religion, try to 
live like a Christian and you will find out. Don't chew the rag 
over there being hypocrites in the church. As long as the United 
States mints coin money and stamp coins there will be found men 
who will attempt to counterfeit them. They also try to counter- 
feit good things and not those that are not good. I once paid a 
visit to a friend of mine, John Wilkins, who was a reporter on 
a Chicago paper when I played ball there, but he is now at the 
head of a department in the treasury at Washington. He showed 
me hundreds of thousands of counterfeit coins and outfits used 
for making dies, etc. He said that the United States pays big 
salaries to some expert counterfeiters to keep them from working 
at that business. I had a good dollar with me, but I didn't walk to 
the window and throw it away just because I had seen all those 
counterfeits. It was worth more than all of them this side of 
hell. You can find them anywhere. They try to imitate good 
things. Let one good magazine come out and it will have many 



12 Life and Labors of 

imitators ; let one breakfast food come out and you will get cream 
of wheat, grape nuts, cream of sawdust, cream of shavings, and 
all out of the same chute. 

"Jesus Christ foretold all about the hypocrites and said they 
were like a grain of mustard seed, small when it is planted, but 
that when it grows and sends forth its branches the birds can 
make their nests therein. You will find all kinds of turkey 
buzzards in the choir loft. If any man will do His word, he shall 
know. A young fellow who was a mason once got mad and 
disowned God. The lodge worked with him one night and the 
master mason was a man who didn't join the church because he 
said there were so many hypocrites in it. When asked why he 
didn't turn the young man out of the lodge because he didn't 
believe in God, as every mason is required to believe in the 
Supreme Being, he said, 'No; we did not turn him out, because 
when a man trusts himself to us, we try to repudiate him.' So 
with the church; when a man trusts himself to the church, we 
try to repudiate him when he backslides. There is no lodge but 
that has many who do not live up to their obligations, and there is 
not a church, Catholic or Protestant, that hasn't hypocrites in it. 
Will a man criticize it because of this? He will if he is a fool 
and if he is a jackass — and he is such if he uses it as an argument 
against the church. In the lodge it is the same. Be as fair to 
God as you are to the lodge. I have a controversy between the 
Catholics and Protestants for not applying church discipline. 
Sometimes the officers of the churches are such that if Jesus 
would appear and say, 'Let him that is without blemish cast the 
first stone,' they would all drop back. That is why the church of 
God don't cut them off. 

"I once approached a woman, one of the cold-storage kind, and 
when I asked her if she was a Christian, she swelled up and said, 
'Sir, since when did you become my father confessor?' I said, 'I 
am not,' and she said, T choose my own creed and don't care to 
go into the church where there are so many hypocrites/ I said, 
'Then you are a very poor judge, for you would rather go with 
the saloon element and all that appertains thereto than to stand 
up for your crowd.' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 13 

"You say there are backsliders, you society people. I'll tell you 
what you do ; you will fill them up at your parties and then after 
they have a taste for the damnable stuff and go a little too far, 
you will kick them out and ostracise them, and then the church 
comes along and puts their feet on a solid rock, but because they 
are still weak and occasionally fall, you turn up your dirty 
proboscis and won't have anything to do with them. Incon- 
sistency is not in the Bible, but in your lives. A lawyer is a 
lawyer because he wants to be ; an editor is an editor because he 
wants to be ; a liar is a liar because he wants to be ; and a banker 
because he wants to be. You can understand it if you want to 
understand it. Square your life by the Bible. If you are a booze- 
fighter you know it will make you stop and you don't want to get 
on the water wagon. Go to people and talk religion and they 
will talk nonsense. Like the old woman who used to swear and 
smoke a pipe. Her grandson said, 'Granny, you shouldn't swear, 
for you will soon die/ and she replied, 'I ain't died yet, have I ?' 
Had he asked her how to boil cabbage, she probably would have 
replied intelligently. Lots of people like to ask fool questions. 

"One time out in Iowa one big yap came to me and said, 'Say, 
Bill, I want to ask you a question.' I said, 'I won't promise to 
answer, but fire away.' He said, 'Where did Cain get his wife?' 
I said, 'From his father-in-law, I guess.' Then he started to quote 
Scripture, stating that it said he got her in the land of Nod, when 
it says nothing of the kind, but does say that he knew his wife in 
the land of Nod and she conceived and bore a child. That's where 
a fool gets into trouble when he tries to quote Scripture. It is 
wonderful so many people take an interest in where Cain got his 
wife, and the neighbor's wife around the corner bothers you old 
geezers more than Cain's did. If this seems a reflection on Cain, 
please remember that he is your friend and not mine, and what is 
the point at issue anyway ? Is it for you to try to find something 
against God ? When they can't find fault with a man, as in the case 
of Harrison, the dirty newspapers took up the cry of his grand- 
father's hat. They are hard put to it when they have to go back 
4,000 years and try to find a flaw against God. If, however, you 
will sit down and read the Scripture you will find that Cain was 






14 Life and Labors of 

128 years old when he went courting. Darwin, that old infidel 
quoting from other writers of his like, says that the population 
will double twice in twenty-five years and allowing seven pairs, 
when Cain was 121 years old there must have been 11,940 
people on the earth at that time. It is reasonable to suppose that 
half of these were females, which would mean that there were 
5,970 buxom damsels for Cain to choose from, and that was 
enough to satisfy the most fastidious. There were all kinds, blue 
eyes, brown eyes, bleached hair — no, not the latter, for in those 
days they didn't do that. I feel sorry for a girl who dyes her 
hair. Let it be like God made it. If He had thought you would 
have looked better with another color He would have given it to 
you. 

"I once asked a bar-keeper why he was in the dirty business 
and he said that if it wasn't for the church votes he couldn't be. 
It makes me mad to see a stall-fed, blear-eyed rummy throw 
it up in my face that if it wasn't for the church votes he could 
not run his detestable business. Hell will be so full of such Chris- 
tians that their feet will stick out of the windows. This infernal 
traffic fills the way with squalor, degradation. No wonder they 
laugh at God because they have the church people by the neck. 
When all the Christian people get together and follow Jesus 
Christ and say to that dirty business, 'You creep into hell/ it will 
creep, and it only exists today by virtue of the church and I defy 
you to contradict it. The Bible says, 'Woe unto him who puts 
a bottle to his brother's lips.' 

* 'Another fool wants to know why God didn't make Eve in the 
same way he made Adam and not take a rib from Adam to do 
it with. Probably He thought He would just cut a slice oft" the 
loaf He had and not make another one. Make your heart believe 
that it is something that I have said that will turn you away from 
Christ and that will be a short cut direct to hell. Some said, 
'Don't preach too hard, Bill ; you have before you some of the 
elite of Decatur.' Ah ! I will tell you a story of a maiden lady 
who was having some old furniture removed and stood by watch- 
ing the men carry an old dresser in which was a mirror. She 
said, 'Be careful and don't break that mirror, for if you did it 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 15 

would change my luck for seven years/ One of the men looked 
at the other and said, 'Hurry up and break it ; it will do her good.' 
If good preaching would have saved you it would have done it 
long ago, so now I will give you something different. Don't lose 
sight of the beautiful truths in the Bible to pick out some of the 
things like the foolish questions. God can't arbitrarily make a 
man good nor the Devil can't arbitrarily make a man bad, but 
each will help you in the way that you turn. 

"I say to a drunkard, 'I have got a book for you/ He takes it 
and reads, 'No drunkard shall enter the kingdom of heaven/ and 
then he asks some fool question. He is like the men coming down 
the Mississippi who had heard great tales of the wonderful beauty. 
He starts out from the muddy waters and goes on and on. He 
meets a traveler and inquires where are the beauties to be seen. 
He replies, 'Sail on, sail on,' and he sails on. He meets another 
and inquires, asking the same question, and the same answer 
comes, 'Sail on, sail on.' It is the third day and standing out 
upon the deck he sees the falls of St. Anthony and doffs his cap 
and says, 'The half was never told.' I say to the man who lives 
down in the muddy waters of life that it is no wonder you see 
no beauty in Jesus Christ. Get up and get out of it. 'Oh,' says 
a man, 'you don't hit me ; I have no bad habits ; I don't drink or 
smoke/ I tell you that you are not high enough up. Did you 
ever go home, gather your family about you and pray? Then 
go out and live it." 

Mr. Sunday also told in this connection about a visit paid by 
him to an iron foundry, and on coming out he asked the manager, 
after thanking him for his courtesy in showing him around, if 
he was a Christian. The man replied that nature was his God. 
He followed with a pretty picture of word painting on this subject 
and eloquently depicted the beauties of nature, but closed that 
part by saying it taught him that God loves a sinner. 

"God made man in his own image and breathed into man the 
breath of life. He did not do this to the lower animals. A man 
asks if his dog has no soul. No, he has not ; he has a memory. 
You can take a horse from Decatur to Chicago, drive him from 
his barn up State street, back and forth several times and 



16 Life and Labors of 

then turn him loose and he will go to the barn, which is more than 
some of you can do. That is memory. Imagination and memory 
are faculties of the mind; eyes, ears, nose, etc., faculties of the 
body, but the lower animals do not possess. These are faith 
faculty, moral faculty, and the faculty of consciousness. Then 
the man says, 'That's what's the matter with me, if I could only 
believe/ To develop your physical body you don't sit around and 
read a book on the subject. See my arm! I can lift ioo pounds 
with it easily but let me tie it to my side for a week and you 
ask me to comb my hair ; I will say I can, but don't want to. Let 
it stay there two weeks and you ask me to comb my hair ; I will 
say I want to, but I can't. It becomes useless for lack of use. 
It is the same way with faith and some of you have very little of 
it left. If you will eat what I tell you and leave alone the 
things I tell you not to, I will make a strong man out of you, and 
if you would believe this you must do what I tell you. 

"Can you teach a dog morals, or faith? He can see a person 
and remember him, but can you tell him about Jesus Christ and 
have him have faith? No, he could not understand you. You 
people live in the garden spot of the world. Let me take you 
to Chicago — and I am not knocking Chicago either ; that is where 
I met my wife, that is where my children were born and I love 
old Chicago — but in around the Maxwell street police station is 
the worst corruption you ever heard of. It is the blackest, vilest, 
rankest, crime-producing spot on earth, and let a child be born 
there and he will know no more about morals than anything, 
but you can take him and teach him morals. You couldn't do 
that with a dog. 

"Conscience is the last. You say, 'Oh, I follow my conscience/ 
You can follow your conscience into hell. I might ask how far 
it is to Oakley, and you will say sixteen miles. I get on a horse 
and start and after I think I have gone far enough I ask a man 
how far I am from Oakley and he says, 'Thirty-two miles/ I 
have gone in the wrong direction, but I followed my conscience. 

"The word of God is the guide. My body is the house for my 
soul, and at last when you stand on the narrow neck of sand with 
the water washing it away from under your feet God will bring 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 17 

the last down on your back and you will cry out, 'O, Father, I for- 
got.' But when you stand before God you will remember every- 
thing, the places where you spent your time in sin, and you will 
see this tabernacle and it will all come back to you, sir. Every 
act of yours is being written down and it will be brought to you 
some day. If it is not good, God pity you." 

In closing he related a story of a man who had staked his all 
which he had concentrated in a beautiful pearl, showing his skill 
as a juggler in throwing it up and catching it under difficulties 
for the applause of the throng. He likened this unto men and 
women who will throw away their chances of salvation and life 
eternal for the passing plaudits of a strange crowd. 



And he spake this parable unto certain of 
them which trusted in themselves that they 
were righteous and despised others. — Luke 
18:10. 

"Two men went up into the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee, 
the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with 
himself: 'God, I thank thee that I am not as other men are, 
plunderers and adulterers ; or even as this publican ; I fast twice 
in the week ; I give tithes of all that I possess.' And the publican, 
standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes to 
heaven. But smote upon his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful 
to me, a sinner.' I tell you, this man went down to his house 
justified, rather than the other. For every one that exalteth 
himself shall be abased. And he that humbleth himself shall be 
exalted." 

Mr. Sunday said : "I want to talk about true religion, and not 
a sham substitute. The Pharisees were the most theological, 
but the least spiritual, of any class that ever lived. And they 
have and are propagating their species in the church. 

"We hear expressions of regret that religion is so generally 
neglected by the majority of people, and no conscientious man 
or woman can reflect on that truth without anguish of heart. We 
2 



1 8 Life and Labors of 

find that two-thirds of what is rendered to God is absolutely use- 
less, formal and void of power — of head and no heart. One 
reason for neglect is because two-thirds of what we offer to 
God don't amount to a hill of beans. That is the reason that the 
fellow outside, there, passes it up. It was to convince such that 
they were not righteous that Jesus spake this parable. The 
Pharisees were a churchly crowd and every church is cursed now 
with them. If they can not run everything, they will tie up their 
purse strings. Let them tie them up and go to the devil. 

"If the preacher told you how to run your business you would 
tell him that you knew more about it than he did. I despise the 
person who wants to dictate and tell the church how to run its 
business. I despise the whisky-voting church member. They 
will pray, 'Thy kingdom come,' and vote for the Devil's kingdom. 
You wonder why the world is not being saved? Think that you 
need a new preacher ? Bah ! ( It is a good thing for some com- 
munities that I am not God for about fifteen minutes. I would 
get the undertaker and the grave-digger busy. ) 

"The Pharisees in the days of Jesus were the churchy crowd. 
They wanted to run everything. Jesus spoke this parable to 
show them that they were not righteous, to show some who 
think that they are righteous that they are not, and also to show 
some why some prayers are answered and others are not. Let 
us find out why it is that prayers are not answered. 

"What is a parable? A parable is a photograph. Or is a 
picture of two objects or beings flashed on a canvas so that in a 
glance you can contrast the difference. So much for that. These 
two men had some things in common. The two went to the 
temple to pray. Both got what they went for. One went for 
nothing and got nothing. The other went for a blessing and he 
got that. If some of you people come here on the lookout for 
something that you don't like, I say, 'God bless your miserable 
soul, you will get plenty of that.' If you come here to get a bless- 
ing you will go out a better man. If you want to scrap, you can 
get it almighty soon. Now there are some things that are 
peculiar to each of these men. First, take the Pharisee. He 
thinks that he is righteous. He puts himself in a class here and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 19 

all the rest of the world in a class there. Read the first seventeen 
chapters of Luke and you will find that the Pharisees hated 
everybody, above all, Jesus. Why? Because Jesus proved to 
be an iconoclast. He refused to dip His colors to that crowd, 
and that was the crowd that willed Him. It was the church that 
killed Jesus Christ. It was the miserable church members of 
His time that killed Him. It was not the Romans that did it, but 
the gang that ran the church. That is the mob that did the busi- 
ness. And that is the mob that is doing it today. Same old 
Devil, same old gang, and same old way of working. I am sick 
of trying to picture Christ (as certain of the day have been) 
as one who would let everybody make a door-mat of him. He 
was no doughfaced, lickspittle proposition. Jesus was the great- 
est scrapper that ever lived. 

"^Notice the Pharisee's attitude when he prayed. It was smooth, 
nice and deferential — like a minister that came to me once in 
Chicago and said, 'William, I have listened to you pray, and if 
you would permit a suggestion, I think that I could help you. 
Now, whenever you pray, make an acrostic of the word "act." A 
for adoration. When you pray adore God. C for confession' — 
and I agreed with him there. And that we should not make the 
special act a job-lot proposition, T was for theology. I told him 
that we would part company right there — for I knew no more 
about it than a jack-rabbit knows about ping-pong. 'Well, I 
thank you, doctor,' said I, 'I never make a prayer without making 
an acrostic on the word "act." If you can form a little formula 
and move God, why, bless you, go ahead and do it. But my 
prayers would not get any higher than the gaspipe.' One trouble 
with the literary societies is : they say that my preaching is awful. 
That it grits on their nerves. Oh, yes, your nerves. Do you 
know what you do ? You sit down and read Shakespeare, an un- 
expurgated edition, and your approval will ring through your 
literary gatherings. And you say that I say things that grate 
-on your nerves. If 'Bill' Shakespeare says it, it is literature; 
but if 'Bill' Sunday says it, it is twaddle. It makes all the dif- 
ference which 'Bill' says it. 

" T thank thee, O God, that I am not as other men are.' You 



20 Life and Labors of 



bor 



can't thank God with one breath and lie about your neighbor 
with the next breath. Keep these two objects in mind — that Jesus 
had in view. Jesus spake this parable, first, to show some who 
think that they are righteous that they are not; second, to show 
why the prayers of some are not answered and others are. This 
man lied at the beginning of his prayer. There are a multitude of 
men that are ten thousand times better than that old scoundrel. 
I'll tell you what is the matter : When you went into the church 
you promised God that you would renounce the world. You lie 
every time you sit down to play a game of cards, go to a dance, 
go to the theater, or drink beer. You said that you would re- 
nounce those things. And they are the stronghold of the Devil. 
Another thing that I am disgusted with is this double standards 
proposition. If your preacher was a card-player or a theater- 
gadder, you would not walk across the street to hear him. Then 
this man said, 'I give tithes to God and I fast/ he was so full 
of his virtues that he forgot about his needs — he never asked 
God for a thing. His prayer was nothing more or less than a 
mere compliment. T thank thee that I am not as others are/ 
'I fast, I give tithes/ A sort of a nominative I, possessive my, 
and objective me. It was eulogy of himself. He condemned 
others. 

"The fact is that the trouble with the human race is just pure 
deviltry. It is with some the devil of intellectuality ; some the 
devil of money, and some the devil of licentiousness, and with 
some the devil of a long tongue. You can go to hell with gray 
matter enough to fill a hogshead. And you can go to heaven 
if you have not enough to fill a thimble. 'God, be merciful to me, 
a sinner/ One man prayed thus with himself, and the other 
man prayed with God. One said that I am all right; the other 
that I am all wrong. One said that I don't need help ; the other 
said, 'Help me, Lord, or I perish/ 

"Let me give you an illustration from my own home: When 
Helen was a little girl about seven or eight years old, she came 
and climbed into my lap one evening and said, 'Papa, let's go to 
bed and tell stories.' I said, T can't, Helen.' 'Why?' 'I have 
to go away tonight.' 'Where are you going, papa ?' T am going 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 21 

to Urbana.' 'Oh ! Is that very far ? Are you coming back then ?' 
'No, I am going to Troy.' 'Are you coming home then?' No, 
I am going to Richmond, and then I must go to Indianapolis. 
Then I guess that I will have you and mamma come down.' She 
threw her arms around me and sobbed and said, 'Please don't 
go away. You are the best friend that I have.' I said that I had 
to go away and preach. 'Please don't go, papa.' 'I have to go, 
and it won't do you any good to cry about it. And I will get you 
a new dress.' 'No, papa, I want you. You are the best friend 
I have. I want you.' And, my friends, that is what God wants 
— just you. Not your fine clothes or your black dress, but 
just you. 

"Let me give you a few receipts if you want to help break 
up a church. Don't come. And when you do come, always come 
late. And if it is too hot or too cold or too wet or too dry, don't 
come. The front seats are not for you, or people might think that 
you are interested. And when you come, always find fault. Don't 
. sing — but sit there like a bump on a log. And don't attend prayer 
meeting. And if you do, don't take part. Don't encourage the 
pastor, but always be sure to tell his faults to other people. And 
if his sermon helps you, don't ever tell him. And if you see a 
stranger, don't shake hands with him, for he might come back 
again. Just give him the frosty mitt and the Klondike. And don't 
ever try to bring anybody to church. If you did, you would fill 
up the empty pews. And always let the pastor's salary be be- 
hind, for he can work on earth and board in heaven. The Lord 
will send angels with trays of food to feed him. And if he don't 
visit you as often as you think that he should, grumble and 
growl — he has nothing to do — only to preach two sermons and 
run a prayer meeting and marry and bury and visit people. If 
you see any one that will take hold and help things along, be sure 
to find fault with them. Never speak to any one about Jesus 
Christ, because if you did they might be converted, and you would 
hurt the Devil's kingdom. Don't go to Sunday-school, for that 
is only for kids. Graduate when you get whiskers and specs. 
Don't be particular about how God's house looks. But be sure 
that your own is spick and span. Insist that your views be adopted 



22 Life and Labors of 

on all occasions, and if the preacher wants a quartet, insist on a 
chorus; and if he wants a chorus, you insist on a quartet. I 
can give you a good many ways to help the thing along." 



For I know him, that he will command his 
children and his household after him, and they 
shall keep the way of the Lord. — Gen. 18:19. 

"I am going to throw myself, with the help of God, on the 
sympathy of this vast audience, and I am sure that what I have 
to say will arrest your attention and meet with your careful con- 
sideration, if not your commendation. I am sure that it will 
grip your heart, and trust that it will be helpful. I ask you 
to take a journey with me to the most sacred spot on earth, the 
place of sweet memories and associations, the home. The longer 
I live, and the more I visit and journey up and down; the more 
I see of joy and sorrow, of pleasure and pain ; the more I see that 
the home problem is the greatest problem that we have to 
confront. Our homes seem to be like great streams belching and 
pouring forth their million streams to blight or bless wherever 
they go. 

"The home should be the center of all that is pure, inspiring and 
God-like. The proper settlement and the improper settlement 
of the question means the weal or woe of the multitude. You can 
build palaces ; you can amass a fortune ; you can sit beneath the 
flash of the candelabra of the multi-millionaire ; you can push 
a button and have a retinue of servants to do your bidding; you 
may have the price to buy anything that heart desires, but I tell 
you, sir, if you sit and wait for your poor, staggering boy who 
bears your name or some daughter who is your image, all the 
wealth that you have and the palaces, will never bring you hap- 
piness. For nothing will drive happiness further from heart and 
home than the misery of drunkenness — that curse to so many lives. 
I believe nothing can make happy the parents of a drunken son. 
Nearly one-half of the inmates of the reformatory at Pontiac com- 
mitted the crimes that sent them there while in a state of home- 
lessness — either voluntary or involuntary. Some of them had 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 23 

no home. The genesis of vagrancy is too great a subject to dis- 
cuss in one message, but I may take it up again. 

"Many children are brought up in idleness. They have lots 
of spending money. They indulge in fast horses and fast 
women with the money that they never earned, and the long line 
of those that have been reared in idleness leaves a long trail of 
misery and dissolute lives, and they tumble into untimely graves. 
Of these there are women of whom too much can not be said in 
condemnation. For the most part they are naturally frivolous, 
coquettish, and extravagant. They throw to the winds their 
womanly virtues, and they have allowed themselves to be flattered 
and cajoled by dirty men. They have given their presence to 
the vaudeville and they have had it in their homes, and their 
children are allowed to witness the almost obscene performances. 
They indulge in gambling until they are more familiar with poker 
chips and bridge whist than the Bible and literature that would 
be of help in the home. Not only is the home happiness dependent 
upon Christianity, but the moral, social and civic influence is 
going to emanate from the Christian home. 

"Every gambler was once nursed at some mother's breast. 
Every prostitute that is merchandising her virtue tottled across the 
floor, and was taught by her mother to walk. And I believe that 
the downfall of most men and women can be traced to some defect 
in the home. If God had arranged it so that we could not take 
our children to heaven with us this would be a veritable hell. 
The prettiest picture in all this old world that one can see is a 
father and a mother with Jesus Christ in their hearts, and to 
see them lock arms and take the children down to the very young- 
est, and all start for the church and heaven. And the blackest 
home is that without God, and to see the father and the mother 
lock arms and take the children by the hands and start for hell. 
The greatest monstrosity is a father with children bearing his 
name while they never hear the name of Jesus, or God, fall from 
his lips, except in profanity. No wonder that they grow up to 
be Godless in the world today. 

"We have in this country over 2,000,000 young men that are 
homeless. Children in lots of homes are only one more boy or 



24 Life and Labors of 

girl for the brothel or the penitentiary. I believe that a child 
that is properly trained won't often find his way to the police 
station. The normal way to get rid of drunkenness is to stop 
raising drunkards. And the way to stop raising them is to get 
rid of the breweries and the saloons. The normal way to get rid 
of thieves is to stop raising them. The way to get rid of hogs is 
to stop breeding them. That is the way to get rid of drunkards — 
get rid of the thing that makes them. The damnable grog shop ! 
So what the child is when he steps on the threshold of the home 
he is going to be in the moral, civil and the social world. What 
you are in the home will largely determine what you will be 
when you go out and rub elbows with the world. 

"Gladstone and Talmage were talking about the questions of 
the day. Gladstone said, 'There is but one question — settle that 
right and you settle all. That is Christianity/ I tell you that 
Christianity in the home will settle the destiny of the nation. And 
you settle the destiny of the grog-shop and you settle every other 
curse. National life will never rise higher than the home, and 
will never fall lower than the home life. Napoleon when asked, 
'What is the greatest need of France?' replied, 'Mothers.' 

"And I say that the greatest need of America is not more col- 
leges, or more banks, not a merchant marine, nor the irrigation of 
more land, but the great need of America is Christian homes, 
today. I have no faith in the woman that will talk about 
heaven and make hell out of her home with her old gatling-gun 
tongue. If I was going to investigate your Christianity I would 
ask the boy who slops your hogs ; or the woman who scrubs your 
floors, washes your dishes, or your dirty duds. I despise to see 
a woman whose kids look like rag-a-muffins, without buttons, or 
patches on their breeches. The kind of hieroglyphics that I like 
to see a mother make are those of patches and buttons. 

"H. W. Grady, who died all too soon for the good of both 
North and South, said that when he went to Washington for the 
first time he walked down Pennsylvania avenue and saw that 
great pile of marble; he said, 'That is the home of the nation,' 
and the tears trickled down his cheek. A few days later he 
started for the Southland and stopped at a plantation where the 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 25 

planter and his wife were God-fearing people and read the Bible 
and prayed, and brought in the servants and children and bowed 
around the family altar each night and morning. And he said, 
'I was mistaken when I said that that pile of marble was the home 
of my nation. The home of my nation is in the homes where 
Jesus Christ is honored, and children are taught to love and 
respect God.' 

"What makes a nation great ? Not high raised battlements ; not 
cities proud with spires and turrets crowned. No, high-minded 
men — that is what makes a nation great. Now I believe in blood 
— good blood — proud blood — honest blood — truth-telling blood ; 
I believe in blood, and blood will tell. The large lip of the house 
of Hapsburg has been famous for its sensuality ; the Stuarts for 
immorality and sensuality, ever since the days of Mary Queen of 
Scots. The Scotch people have been famous for their persistency ; 
the Danes for their love of the sea ; the Welsh for their religious 
fervor; the English for their love of the ancient; the Jews for 
their faculty of accumulating money ever since the days of Abra- 
ham. He was worth at the present rate of money $1,400,000,000. 
I believe that men are largely what their mothers have made 
them. The mother of Nero was a murderess. The mother of 
Philip Doddridge brought him up on Bible history. 

"I believe that one of the most powerful factors of today in 
determining success or failure is heredity. To me authority and 
the home are inseparable for success. I have traveled up and 
down and met every form of beast and brute and become con- 
vinced that neither law nor Gospel can make a nation great with- 
out home example and authority. 

"I believe if a boy has home surroundings and judicious control 
he will not often find his way to the reformatory. There are 
homes that are immoral. That parent that can not bear to correct 
the boy may have to stand and see him corrected, in the reforma- 
tory. Anarchy is not born in the Haymarket of Chicago. The 
indulgent parent is sowing hell for himself. Obedience to the 
laws of God and man is settled in the home. If you are not 
going to obey father and mother you will not obey the social 
and moral law of the land. I don't like the mother that turns her 



26 Life and Labors of 

children over to a governess or a nurse, and that fool mother 
spends five nights a week at the theater or the club, or hugging 
or kissing a brindle-nosed pug. 

"I am not surprised that the dogs turn out better than the kids. 
And you neglect your home by loafing at the club and the liter- 
aries and at lodge, and you can clothe your children in furs and 
deck them with laces and ribbons that would confuse a French 
dressmaker, but I want to tell you they are orphans, just the same. 
We bemoan the fact that India tosses children into the mouths of 
crocodiles, but we are tossing our children into the mouth of 
social dissipation. 

"I can tell you a few good 'don'ts.' Don't tell your children 
what you don't mean. Don't break a promise to them. And don't 
talk about your neighbors, because if you do, they will begin it. 
And don't be perpetually scolding them. And don't hurt their 
self-respect by licking them before some one. Take them upstairs. 
And don't overdress them and give them too many presents and 
make them proud. Teach them to tell the truth. Don't make 
them like the little boy, who said, when asked: 'How old are you, 
little boy?' 'Five at home, six at school, and four on the street 
cars.' The dirtiest money in your old pocket is the money you lied 
to the conductor about to beat him out of confessing that your kid 
was five years old. No wonder that the child will grow up to lie. 

"We don't pay enough attention to the school teachers. If there 
is anybody that I have respect for it is the school teacher. And 
there is only one "office I ever want and that is on the school 
board. The first thing that I would do would be to raise the 
salaries. The barkeeper makes more than the preacher, and the 
bootblack makes more than the teacher. The two most indispensa- 
ble classes on earth are the preachers and the school teachers. 
And they are the poorest paid on earth. You can't get young 
men to go to the seminaries because there is little before them 
but starvation wages. In some states in the Union the average 
wage a few years ago was $1.01 a day. In Maryland it was 90 
cents a day; in Illinois, $1.36. And a bootblack said he got $40 
a month and his tips made the sum $85. The bootblack gets more 
for shining shoes than the teacher for shining brains. The 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday ' 27 

teachers come in the spring with cheeks like roses, and quit in the 
fall with cheeks like lilies, because they have been working so 
hard over some little nonentity that you sent there. Wages in 
labor unions have increased 50 per cent, but the wages of the 
school teachers, and the ministers, remain about the same." 



// any man will do his will he shall know of 
the teaching whether it be of God, or whether I 
speak of myself. — John 7 :17. 

"I want to make my message so plain tonight that not a man or 
woman or child can leave leave this tabernacle and say, 'I didn't 
understand what he meant. I went there because I was tired of 
sin and because I wanted to be a Christian. I left my prejudice in 
the office, or locked up with my law book, in the medicine case, 
or shoved it in the bank vault, and locked it up with my money, 
closed my books, and left my prejudice, and went to the tabernacle 
with my mind open for conviction and enlightenment, in order to 
learn what to do, and then to do it, for I claim to be a reasonable 
man.' 

"I would like to make my message as plain as God made it, for 
God has made it so plain that though a man be a fool he need 
not err therein. I would like to strip it of its swaddling clothes 
of mysticism and philosophy and speculation that human ingenuity 
has wrapped about it, and let it stand forth in its naked simplicity, 
that you may see, and understand, and obey, and go out of here 
a Christian. 

''Somebody has said, 'God requires and demands of every man 
and woman three things, whether you be white or black, learned or 
illiterate, native or foreign, rich or poor.' God requires and 
demands of you three things, no matter whether you live in a 
hovel or a palace ; God requires three things of every man that has 
a mind to know right from wrong, hot from cold, black from 
white, and good from evil. God requires and demands of you 
three things : First, a willing mind and desire to know the truth, 
and a determination to forsake every known sin. 'If there be 
first a willing mind, it is accepted according to what a man hath, 



28 Life and Labors of 

and not according to what he hath not.' And although God is 
infinite, He can not save you against your will. 

"God has decreed the freedom of your will, and stops, there. 
We have got to adopt this principle. As you get light you will 
follow that light. And as you get more light, follow that, but 
so far as you know and understand, you are going to live up to 
all the light that you get. And now you are willing to forsake 
every known sin. And as God shows you something else in your 
life as a sin, you will forsake that. But now you will forsake 
that every known sin. And as more light comes and as it is 
revealed that things in life should be given up, you will give them 
up and be a man. You can not do less than be a Christian, or a 
man. You may be an automaton, but not a man. 

"Second, the desire to know the truth, in order that you might 
obey the truth. Knowledge will be your condemnation. God 
will show in the judgment that you know what to do, but would 
not do it. He will show that you had mind to understand what 
was said, but not the manhood to be and to do what you heard. 
The most cursed ambition of the human heart is the selfish desire 
for knowledge. But a desire for knowledge in order that you 
might do, in order that you might develop character and become 
a Christian, a thursting after knowledge in order that knowledge 
might lead you through obedience to be a better man — that is 
noble. But mere wanting to know in order to sneer, and com- 
pare it with other things that you know — that is damnable. But 
in order to know to do, in order to be doing, that you might be 
Christlike — that is great. I love to meet such a man. But if you 
live up to all the light that you have got to take a step before 
you, I will stand in front of this tabernacle with a lantern at 
midnight. A man will come along and say, 'Why don't you go 
home?' And I would say, 'I am not going until this lantern 
lights the path all the way for me.' Well, then, you will rot in 
darkness. As long as I stand there, the rays of that lantern will 
penetrate just so many feet, and if I will step from there over 
here, then the rays will penetrate the darkness, just the space 
that I take from there to here. But as long as I stand here, over 
there will be dark. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 29 

"That is just exactly the way with you. As long as you stop 
where you are you will never see a ray yonder. But when you 
reach what will be darkness as long as you remain here, the 
darkness will disappear. We see that everywhere. 

"The third thing is: Honest, open public confession, with 
your lips, and with your life, that so far as you know and under- 
stand you are going to be a Christian. God will never give you 
more light than you use. Now, we are all caught in the big net- 
work that we call society, and we rub elbows with our neighbors. 
If you are a Godless, vicious, scoffing, drinking libertine, you 
will affect others, and others will become like you, if unfortunate 
enough to come in contact with you. If you are a Godly, noble, 
pure, virtuous man, others will be influenced by your personality. 

"No man lives unto himself alone. If your child has the 
diphtheria you are quarantined. If you have the smallpox a 
yellow flag is put in front of the house. They don't want others 
to have that disease. Don't think that you can't spread sin just 
the same as disease. And you damn a neighborhood and man- 
hood and womanhood, and you can spread corruption wherever 
you go. Lodge members, business associates, society, the people 
of Decatur, have a right to know by your lips and your life that 
so far as you know and understand, you are going to be a Chris- 
tian. You can not be a man and be less. 

"There are two ways to learn about everything. One is theo- 
retical and the other practical. I was in a town in Iowa and they 
said to me, 'There is one man here that we want to get for 
Christ/ I said, 'Who is he? and what does he do?' And they 
said, 'His name is Batchelder, and he runs an egg-crate factory.' 
He made paper out of which they made crate fillers for egg crates 
— made the crates and a machine made the paper fillers. It was 
the most intricate piece of machinery that I ever looked upon. 
It fed from three rolls, and cut the paper and sliced it up, and 
finished the egg fillers just as you see them in the crates. I went 
down to see this man and he showed me through the factory. 
There stood the machine about fifteen feet high and about as big 
around as ten men could reach by joining hands. He attempted 
to explain the machinery, and said, T invented this, and this 



3° Life and Labors of 

makes this, and that does that, and then you will understand by 
this force of power.' 'Hold on,' I said, 'I don't understand you.' 
He took up a filler and said, 'This machine makes it.' I said, 
'Show me, I am from Missouri.' He said, 'You don't doubt my 
word, do you?' 'No, you say that it makes it. I never saw it 
make one/ 'Well, you come back tomorrow morning and I will 
show you the machine making them.' And I went back the 
next morning and the machine was repaired, and the machine 
made and dropped down fifty-two a minute, and I saw the ma- 
chine make them, and I know that it would make what I saw it 
make. 

"There are two ways to learn about God and religion and every- 
thing else. One would be as impossible as an attempted explana- 
tion about machinery. In order to know about God, you would 
have to understand all mystery and prophecy, and have the great- 
est mind that the world has ever known. In other words, you 
would have to be God yourself. But the way to know about 
God is to surrender your will to Him, and to be ready to do His 
will. 

"Now then, I might as well try to speak with my feet, or to 
think with my fingers, or that pulpit might as well try to walk, 
as for you to understand or know anything about God by any 
other method or plan, other than to surrender your will to God's 
will. You never will know Him. 

"A lot of you fellows are sitting there and speculating your 
way into hell. A lot sit and try to figure out a way to heaven, the 
same as two plus two, equals four. You fool! God Almighty 
is not an explanation. But He is a revelation. And God won't 
reveal Himself if you shut up your will. Not if you keep Him 
out of your heart. 

"Now I meet a class of men who say, 'I take nothing on trust ; 
I must see for myself.' And they call men and women of faith 
weak-brained and overcredulous souls. And yet, my friends, truth 
on the authority of others, on the testimony of others, is the 
basis of jurisprudence, of business life, and the family life. You 
can not convict a man in court unless the judge and the jury 
believe the witnesses. To believe testimony on the authority of 
others is the very basis of law. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 31 

"Now, I never was in Rome, but I can tell you of St. Peter's, 
and the Seven Hills, and the Vatican. I can tell of the roads, and 
the coliseum, on the authority of others. I would be a fool to 
stand up here, and if the man told me that he had been to Rome 
and seen it all — then to tell him I did not believe, because I had 
not been there. 

"And you are just as big a fool to tell a man who has tried 
religion that there is nothing in it, when you, you big fool, 
have never tried it. Now I didn't live in the days of Jesus and the 
Apostles, but I believe the Gospels as the authentic, reliable, 
trustworthy, testimony on the authority of others. My lawyer 
tells me my case has no standing in the court. I believe him. My 
physician says that I have pneumonia, or typhoid fever. I be- 
lieve if a chemist tells me that two gases combine to make water. 
A newspaper tells me that the battleship fleet is on the way to the 
Pacific coast. I believe on the authority or testimony of others. 
Then am I a fool if I believe that Book on the authority of 
others? No. A fool when I don't. I do it in everything else, 
and why not in religion? One way is a foolish way — that is to 
try to explain. The other is to start the machine, and see if it 
produces the goods — and if it does, you have to believe. In other 
words, start to live as God wants you to do, and see if God won't 
make out of men what He says He will. Do that and it will lead 
you to a knowledge of sin. Many a man and woman will say 
tonight, 'I am good. I am even a member of the church.' But 
you listen to me. Paul said, 'All scripture is given by inspiration 
of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, 
for instruction in righteousness — that the man of God may be 
perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works/ 

"Paul said this, T am the chief of sinners' — but I don't believe 
that Paul got more sinful every day. But every day that he lived 
he was striving harder to be more like Jesus Christ. And the 
more that he did, the more strange it seemed to him that he could 
ever have been the kind of man that he used to be. 

"And you might be tonight in a dark cellar and be perfectly 
satisfied and contented, sleeping and dozing there. A man pries 
open the door and lowers a candle, and the positive force and 



3 2 Life and Labors of 

the darkness negation make you dissatisfied with your surround- 
ings. If I stood in this tabernacle at midnight and heard the cry 
of a baby I could light a tiny match, and instantly every cubic inch 
of darkness would be affected. The match is a positive force and 
the darkness a negation, and religion is a positive power that will 
help you to overcome sin if you will only submit. So if a man 
pries open the cellar door and lowers a candle and the darkness 
is dispelled, and the man sees a venomous serpent about to strike 
him, he wants to get out. What made him dissatisfied? The 
light reveals what he was, but without light he would have been 
satisfied. Until you start to do God's will, and let the light in, 
you will be satisfied to gamble, and drink, and swear, and to lie. 
But you start to do the will of God, and let the light in, then you 
will be surprised that you ever could have done those things. Then 
you will have plenty of knowledge of sin if you just start to do 
the will of God. Like a soldier said in a regimental prayer meet- 
ing, 'Comrades, pray for me ; that I may be a Christian,' and he 
sat down weeping. One of his comrades said that he thought 
that in view of the past life that he had lived, he ought to have 
manifested more sorrow for sin, and it made the soldier feel 
badly to think that they questioned his motive, and he did not 
return for three weeks. And when he came back he arose and 
gave this testimony: 

" T understand that some of my comrades said that in view of 
my past life I ought to have shown more sorrow for sin. I have 
been a bad man. I heard of a man that died of delirium tremens. 
I gave him his first glass of whisky. I received a letter telling of 
a girl dying in the house of illfame, and my sin put her there. I 
have not prayed from that night I asked' you to pray for me but 
that I have asked God to spare my life many years that I might 
radiate from my life, an influence for good which will counteract 
the influence for evil from my life/ And I will tell you, sir, that 
hundreds of citizens of Decatur, members of churches if you 
will be honest and manly and womanly, you would stand here 
on your feet tonight and walk down here, and say : 'God forgive 
me for Christ's sake, and spare my life for many years, that there 
may go from my life an influence for good which will counteract 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 33 

the influence for evil that has gone from my life in the days and 
years that I have lived in Decatur, and mingled with the church 
and the lodge and the G. A. R. and in society, and been a blight 
and a mildew on the people that I touched.' That is what you 
would do if you are a decent man or woman. If you won't do 
it, I say it is because you have not the principles of manhood in 
you. 

"To be a Christian, means to be a man — to be decent, and to 
do as God wants you to do. A man will be a Christian if he is 
decent, and if he is not a Christian, he forfeits any claim to 
decency. 

"A man says, 'Look here, Mr. Sunday, what is a person going 
to do when he is full of doubts?' Well, I am not looking for 
doubts. The trouble with a lot of you fellows, you come and 
pretend to be looking for a light, and then go out and associate 
with a Godless crowd, and will read some book to prove that 
there is no light. And claim that you are searching for the light 
and then blow it out. That position is not reasonable for a man. 

"I don't believe there is any infidel threading the magic maze 
of unbelief; I don't believe that there is any drunkard that is 
staggering to hell; I don't believe that there is any gambler 
leaning over the greasy card table ; I don't believe that there is 
any fallen woman that is crawling in the red light district, selling 
her womanhood for dirty money; I don't believe that there is 
any man that is crawling into the arms of infamy to propagate 
his triple extract of infamy ; I don't believe that there is a man or 
a woman in Decatur, or any other city on God's dirt, that is 
bound hand, foot and mind by greed, lust, avarice, and unbelief, 
but that that man or woman could arise in all freedom and be 
saved, if they would only submit to Jesus Christ. 

"And I throw down the challenge! [Applause.] I dare you 
to try it ! The trouble with you is that you know that if you are 
a drunkard it would make you sober; that if you are a libertine 
that it would keep you away from that woman, and that if you are 
a cusser that you would quit. You don't want to quit. And you 
don't want to pray — that is the trouble. 

"Doctor Rainsford of St. George's, of New York, before 

3 



34 Life and Labors of 

coming here was in London. A noted skeptic professor of the 
University of Berlin, came to pay Doctor Rainsford a visit. Doctor 
Rainsford, knowing his trouble, prepared a sermon to help him. 
On the way home after delivering the sermon Doctor Rainsford 
said to the old skeptic : 'Well, professor, what do you think of it' 
He replied, 'It is very pretty, the way you picture it, but I don't be- 
lieve it.' He said, 'Don't you believe there possibly is a God?' He 
said, 'I have never denied that possibly there was a God, but I 
don't believe He made a revelation of Himself to us or humanity.' 
Doctor Rainsford said, 'Professor, if there is a God, don't you 
think He could make a revelation of Himself ?' 'Oh, yes, if there is 
a God and if He were so disposed, I have no doubt but what He 
could make a revelation of Himself.' Doctor Rainsford said, 'Pro- 
fessor, if there is a God, and if we are His cratures, and if we are 
going to be damned if we don't do His will, and are saved if we 
do, isn't it important for us to know what that will is and would it 
not be reasonable for God to give us a mind that would compre- 
hend and understand that will?' 'Oh,' said the old professor, 'I 
would have to believe that or it would crush the life out of me. If 
there is a God and we are His creatures and if we are going to be 
damned if we don't do His will and if we are going to be saved 
if we do, God would be duty bound to reveal His will to us. He 
would be compelled to give us mind to grasp and understand His 
will for it would not be fair to put us in the world and damn us 
for not doing His will when we don't know what His will is.' 
Doctor Rainsford said, 'Professor, have you ever sought to find 
out whether there is a God?' He said, 'No, I didn't.' Doctor 
Rainsford said, 'Professor, are you willing to find out?' He said 
he was willing. Many men and women are willing to do any 
reasonable thing to prove they are wrong and God is right, and in 
fairness for you God is willing to prove to you that He is right 
and that you are wrong. Rainsford said, 'Come here, professor/ 
They walked over and he got down on his knees and Doctor 
Rainsford prayed. He said, 'Professor, you say you want to know 
whether there is a God and whether He ever reveals Himself. 
Now pray.' He said, 'I never prayed, Doctor Rainsford.' 'Pray/ 
said Doctor Rainsford. Said the professor, 'I don't know the 
theories of God/ He said, 'Pray, Professor/ 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 35 

"The old professor started out and said : 'Oh, God, if there is a 
God and if I am your creature, if that book is a revelation from 
you to us, if Jesus is your Son, reveal Him to me, reveal myself 
to myself, and I promise you I will accept Jesus Christ and I will 
follow Him the best I know how, till the day I die.' No sooner 
had he offered the prayer than he leaped to his feet and grabbed 
Doctor Rainsford's hand and said : 'I see it, and it is charmingly 
beautiful ; Jesus is the Son of God and the Bible is the Word of 
God. I am a sinner. I will accept Him as my Saviour, and I 
will do His will/ 

"He knew there was a God and you sit there without giving 
God a chance to reveal Himself to you. You have got a per- 
verted will ; you will go where it pleases yourself. You do things 
you do because it pleases yourself. It may not please you to get 
drunk, it may not please you to swear, it may not please you to 
be vicious, it may not please you to steal, it may not please you to 
lie, but you do what you do because it pleases yourself. "Now 
then listen. When God by His spirit imparts His nature to 
me, then I would like to please Him instead of myself, as long as 
I have got the spirit of the Devil then I seek to please myself, and 
I don't care about pleasing God. The only law that half the 
people recognize is the law of their own desire, they do the 
things they do because they want to do them, and they don't care 
a picayune whether they are in harmony with God's law or not. 
They don't read the Bible. 

"Yet they all do those things. You tell them they are sinners 
and they look in your face and swell up like a toad and throw out 
their chests and draw in their diaphragm and say, 'Oh, sir, I 
own an automobile, I live in the best house in Decatur, I am 
related by marriage to the oldest families, they settled here 
seventy-five years ago.' That don't cut any ice with God. 

"Probably when you built your family tree you put some of 
the limbs that your ancestors hung on around on the back side 
so the people can't see them. Now when God's spirit comes to 
me, God imparts His nature to me and God's nature is to please 
God. Sure. A woman comes along and says: 'Your affection 
is perverted ; you love what you hate and you hate what you ought 



36 Life and Labors of 

to love. You love whisky and you ought to hate it. You love 
adultery and you ought to hate it. You love to lie and you ought 
to hate it, and practice trickery and intrigue in your business and 
you ought to hate it. You love what you ought to hate and you 
hate what you ought to love.' 

"A woman says: 'Mr. Sunday, I just dearly love a novel; the 
Bible seems so dry.' Sure, you are a church member, too. I 
tell you what is the matter with you. God's spirit isn't in your 
life. If God's spirit was in your soul you would hate the novel 
and love the word of God. Some woman says : 'Mr. Sunday, I 
just dearly love to go to the theater. I would have gone to see 
Mrs. Pat Campbell tonight if I thought you wouldn't miss me 
from the choir/ I will pull off my shoe and bet it against a hair 
pin that that is what some of you said. [Applause.] 

"Some woman says, 'I dearly love the theater.' If an opera 
and the prayer meeting come on the same night you love to go to 
the opera and pass up the prayer meeting. You love to go to the 
opera because the spirit of the Devil has got you. That is the 
reason you don't go, you miserable old church member you, that 
is the reason you don't go. 

"Some woman says: 'Mr. Sunday, I just dearly love to play 
cards.' Certainly the Devil loves that. When God's spirit comes 
to me then I hate cards and I hate cards and love the Bible. That 
is the reason you love the cussed things, because you don't love 
him. 

"So your affections are perverted. That is the reason of it. So 
when God comes in then you get new tastes, when God comes in 
you get new desires. When God comes in you get new love, and 
when God comes in you get new hates. You will love the Bible 
and hate beer ; you will love prayer and hate the opera. You will 
hate the novel and you will hate the theater. 

"Now, somebody says: 'Look here, suppose I do. I would, 
Mr. Sunday, come down and take your hand right now, but there 
are so many hypocrites in the church.' You shut your mouth. 
You will agree with me that I don't spare that gang. [Applause.] 
Say, if there is anything I pride myself on as being expert in it 
is skinning the hypocrites. If there is any class of sinners this 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday. 37 

side of hell I have studied it is a hypocrite. If there is any person 
I love to go against it is a hypocrite. I tell you, Dwight, I can 
skin that bunch and tack the hide on the barn door to dry quicker 
than you can spit on a whet stone and start it to whet your jack 
knife. I don't believe that the hypocrites in the church are keep- 
ing many men or women from being Christians. If they honestly 
want to do right and please God. 

"You might just as well say to me, 'There is a married woman 
that isn't virtuous,' and use that as an excuse that you are not 
virtuous. You might just as well say, 'There is a banker that 
stole the deposits in his bank,' and use that as an excuse for steal- 
ing the poor people's savings. Not at all. No hypocrite stands 
between men and the spot where I stand now, until at last by the 
grace of God I shall look into the presence of Jesus Christ. 
Hypocrites all go the other way. There will be no hypocrites in 
heaven, they will all be in hell, and if you don't want to go to 
hell and spend eternity with that gang you had better get in the 
church and do the other way you think people ought to do, or you 
will go to hell, and spend your money with that bunch that you 
have no use for here. Down here you don't have to associate 
with them; when you are in hell you have got no voice in the 
matter. Hypocrites will be in hell ; give your heart to God. 

"Some fellow says to me, and they always say it in every town 
I go into: 'Well, I tell you, Mr. Sunday, when I make up my 
mind to be a Christian I tell you I will be one.' I have heard 
those old windjammers before. Say, if you know so well how 
the rest of us ought to live and you have so high ideals, why in 
God's name don't you come and set an example before us and 
show us how to do it. When you hear a man talk like that put 
him down as a four-flusher, just as quick as you know how. 

"Somebody says : 'Mr. Sunday, I would come tonight and take 
your hand but I am afraid I can't hold out.' Some of you old 
fellows have been holding out until you haven't any hair on your 
head between you and hell, some of you have held out for the 
Devil until you are gray and wrinkled, and your steps shorten as 
you near the coffin. Can't hold out. What does that mean ? It 
means you don't want to be decent and do right. 



38 Life and Labors of 

"A man owns a farm. If he breaks his harness or breaks 
a point off his plow what does he do, throw the whole business 
out ? No. If he has got any sense he will come to town and get 
the harness fixed and the plow sharpened. All right ; I break my 
watch ; what will I do, throw it away? No, take it to the jeweler 
and have it fixed. 

"If an engine jumps the track and goes into the ditch what 
would the Wabash do, throw up their hands and quit? No, they 
send for the wrecker and take the engine to the round house 
and fix it up, paint her up and take her out and limber her up 
and put her on to No. 4 and away she goes. Certainly, if I break 
down on the way to heaven, I am going into the machine shop and 
get fixed up and then go on, even if I fall down 500 times. 

"You say you are afraid you can't hold out. I am an ordained 
minister. I have never officiated at but one wedding. God 
forgive me for that, I will never do it again. I went to the 
preacher and said, 'This fellow wants me to officiate at the wed- 
ding ; he belongs to your church, I don't want to ; I think he ought 
to go to you.' 'No,' he said, 'I would rather have you officiate 
than anybody else/ So I did, and the fellow gave me $10 and I 
gave it to the preacher, and he kicked up the biggest row I have 
ever heard of. Four or five have asked me to officiate since I have 
been here, and I said: 'No, sir, not for $400 apiece.' I never 
did but that once, and my wife told me not to then. The only 
time I didn't accept Mrs. Sunday's advice, and I am sorry of it. 

"Suppose you come and ask me to tie you and I did (but I 
won't) suppose I did (but I won't, mind you) suppose I would 
say to this young man: 'What is your name?' 'My name is 
Charely.' 'Charley, do you take Kate to be your lawful wedded 
wife and do you promise to love, honor and obey until death do 
each of you part?' He says: 'Bill, I am afraid I ca-a-n-nt hold 
out.' 

"You know what that girl would do, she would tell you to 
hike and she would get some man that would hold out. I tell 
you you will have a whole lot of differences that you will have 
to adjust. If you had known a few things about that woman 
before you married her you would not have married her. And 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 39 

I bet she has learned a lot of things about you in the twenty 
years you have been married that she never thought was in you, 
or she never would have said yes to you. You would readjust a 
lot of things. Yes, but you have gone on the best you could. You 
look back and see where you have made a mistake. Yes. God 
says : 'All right, do the same thing with me, come to me and we 
will fix it all right/ 

"Somebody says, 'Look here, suppose I do, what then? Well, 
I know when I am saved.' Yes, indeed, you will. The Bible says, 
'I know when I have pleased Him.' Now then, start out believing 
and you will start to grow, like this sculptor who started to carve 
and had nothing but black dirty marble. As he served and 
chiseled there stood before him a beautiful form and it seemed 
that all that was needed was God's breath upon it and it would 
breathe and walk." 



The Master is come and calleth for thee. — 
John 11 :28. 

"It was my privilege to hear an address on this topic and to 
hear that, together with what I have heard and thought, I desire 
to give to you today. I suppose if I had practiced for years under 
the most famous teacher of voice culture I could not make these 
words sound as they must have sounded as they fell from the 
lips of the one who uttered them. I can tell by the expression 
on a person's face whether they are Christians and you can tell 
when they bear testimony by the tone of voice whether it rings 
true or not and whether they are walking close with God. When 
death comes, death takes precedence over everything. You with- 
draw from society, you close your business and let nothing inter- 
fere. I tell you this revival in Decatur ought to have first thought 
and every business man ought to put it before everything else. 
If I go down to a business man and invite him to take a ride 
with me he would probably say he was too busy. I call upon 
him tomorrow and he is not there. I ask where he is and the 
baby is sick. He won't be down all day. He stayed at home 
because the baby was sick but he couldn't take a ride with me. 



40 Life and Labors of 

"You could, if you wanted to, spare a little time from your busi- 
ness during the days of this revival ; you could and you would if 
you realized its importance — that is all there is to it. I don't mean 
to convey the impression to you that people are more dead spirit- 
ually than at any other time ; there is danger that if they are not 
brought to Jesus Christ at this time that they never will be. This 
meeting ought to have precedence over all other social engage- 
ments during the few remaining days of the revival. A minister 
once said there was nothing he loved or dreaded more than a 
revival. That may seem a paradox because he knew what it 
would mean, as an opportunity to some men who would yield 
to Christ and dreaded what it would mean to others who re- 
jected Him. He would be the savior of life unto life to some and 
the savior of death unto death to others. The same sermon may 
produce opposite effects. Because of the raising of Lazarus from 
the dead, many believed ; and also from that day forth they took 
counsel to kill him, so it was said of the Pharisees and scribes. 
I can go down town and find men in Decatur who would kill me 
if they were not afraid they would have to stick their heads in a 
noose and drop that quick. The same revival meeting will purify 
some and send others staggering to hell. It is the same old Devil 
and you are the same old hypocrites as in the day of Jesus. 

"Notice first. They seemed to place undue reliance in human 
aid; they sent to Jesus saying, 'Behold he whom thou lovest is 
sick/ You would naturally have thought if He loved them He 
would have gone up to the house on being informed that he was 
sick. I read He loved Mary, Martha and Lazarus and it took 
more love for Jesus to stay away. He had healed the sick and 
by raising Lazarus from the dead, Jesus was trying to convince 
those old hypocrites that He was the Son of God. I heard of 
a leading church member who went to the office of an infidel and 
ripped me up the back from hell to breakfast. I would rather 
take my chance with the infidel than with that church member. 
I would rather take off my hat to that infidel if he was here; 
but the church member I would soak him. Don't you come up to 
me and say, T wish you would speak to my husband but don't say 
that I told you.' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 41 

"If I have more influence over your husband than you have, 
he must be a queer duck. The fact is God has laid it on your 
head to do that very thing and I won't do it. As I go up and 
down the land, I find the pastors are willing to do their utmost. 
Once in a while I find some with a yellow streak in them, but as 
a rule they are the finest class of fellows and will stand right by to 
the last ditch and do all in their power. I wouldn't have any- 
body with me that was a shirker or who would sidestep. 

"Jesus Christ will never come in all His redemptive power until 
the church goes out to meet Him. The Lord will take care of 
those who fight for Him. What could He not do if all the 6,000 
church members were lined up for Him. They had to have a 
personal influence with Jesus Christ. I don't believe it is God's 
will that we should preach and should not be converted. There 
are a whole lot of bench-warmers who sit fanning themselves 
while others go out to the unconverted. You fold your arms and 
say, God has blessed Mr. Sunday and his workers elsewhere and 
He will surely do it here. There is a German proverb, 'The good 
is enemy, of the best.' I believe that 8,000 or 10,000 people 
would be converted if the church of Jesus Christ would just drop 
everything and go to work. The work is being done by the 
young people. A lot of you men are not doing anything and 
you are not earning your salt. A lot of you women and a lot 
of you people in the choir haven't moved an inch. Oh, if you 
miserable backsliders would only get a move on you, what would 
we not do by a week from tomorrow night when my contract 
closes. 

"Only a part of the family seemed interested. Martha as 
soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went out to meet Him. 

"I am glad to speak a word for Martha; she is my favorite.^ 
She was a woman of vim and energy and she got a move on her. 
I despise a dreamer. Martha went out to meet Jesus and Mary, 
a bench-warmer, sat still in the house. If I had to take the sisters, 
I would take Martha before dinner and Mary after. Mary was 
a Uneeda biscuit, veal-loaf kind of a person. I am glad to speak 
a good word for Martha. Why you say, 'Mr. Sunday, didn't 
Jesus rebuke Martha by saying, "Thou art careful and troubled 



42 Life and Labors of 

about many things ?" ' but Jesus was there with his disciples and 
dinner had to be gotten ready for the hungry crowd. Mary, the 
lazy loot, sat in the front parlor and she called, 'Mary, Mary, 
carest thou not that I serve alone? Don't you smell those pota- 
toes burning and I have got to bake biscuit for that hungry bunch.' 
I tell you I like Martha ; she is a dandy, and don't you forget it. 
If Jesus was ever brought to a dead man, Martha would have 
to bring Him. You go out and talk with sinners ; that is the 
true test. I have never seen it where a revival didn't start that 
way. Another lesson is the sisters learned things. Martha went 
out and learned some things which are never learned by sitting 
still. She gained an experience which increased her faith. Martha 
jumped up and said, 'Come on.' Mary sat still. Mary doesn't 
like Mr. Sunday's preaching. So she sends Martha to tell him 
to come to her. Go tell Mary that I want to see her. 

"If Martha runs clear outside of town to meet Jesus and Jesus 
says, where is Mary, then she has to run back to Mary and say, 
'The Master called for thee.' Jesus will come in all his redemptive 
power if the people would go out to meet Him. Jesus said to the 
girls, 'Where have you laid him ?' Mary said, 'Go over that little 
bridge to the kitchen, turn to the right around that lettuce bed and 
don't step on the geraniums, and you will find three sepulchers, 
and he is laid in the third one.' 'Where have you laid him?' 
'Come and see/ and Jesus said, 'Take ye away the stone.' He will 
remove the stone of worldliness, half-heartedness, criticism, a 
cold spirit, apathy. He will roll them all away. Some say, 'Why 
can't God do it today ?' God can and does when we are willing. I 
am planning for a day of fasting and prayer next Wednesday. 
The ministers will have meetings in their different churches. 
Cottage prayer meetings will be held in the various districts 
during the day and there will be preaching in the Tabernacle 
morning, afternoon and evening, so cook up provisions ahead 
that we may devote the whole day to fasting and prayer, that 
hundreds may be brought into the kingdom." 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 43 



The Son of man is come to seek and to save 
that which was lost. — Luke 19:10. 

He said the division of the Bible into chapters and verses 
proves embarrassing. In the original it was not subdivided; the 
subdivisions are man-made for convenience in memorizing. In 
the original there are no periods or commas or colons or semi- 
colons or verses or chapters. Man divided it up into chapters and 
verses and sentences so as to aid in memorizing. Sometimes a 
chapter begins in the middle of a story and if you want to under- 
stand one chapter you will have to read the one that precedes or 
follows. This is especially true of the 18th and 19th chapters of 
Luke, which should always be read together. 

"Jesus is on a final journey to Jerusalem and He has been an- 
swering the questions of the Pharisees and the Sadducees re- 
specting divorce, and blessing little children. As soon as He 
finished this latter act of grace a rich young man met Jesus and 
said 'Good Master, what good thing shall I do to inherit eternal 
life?' Jesus turned to him and said: 'What do you call me 
good for? There is only one that is good; that is God.' 

"That used to puzzle me. I used to say, if Jesus was not 
good who was? Jesus and the young ruler, a Jew, and this 
young ruler professed to love God, and was familiar with the 
law, and the Psalms, and the Prophets, and Jesus said to him: 
'It is mighty queer that you, being a Jew, will come to me and 
ask of me, "Good Master, what must I do to inherit eternal 
life?" when you have been among those that reject my claims 
to being the Son of God, and have said that I am a fraud. If I 
am not what I claim to be I am not even good, so don't bother 
me by coming around and asking me what to do when you have 
said I am not the Son of God. Don't come around me; just 
stay away from here.' 

"A little touch of sarcasm there — but you will not blame Him. 
He came to Jesus and asked the question which could not have 
taken Jesus over ten or fifteen minutes to answer and the young 
fellow left him and went back to his home and to his wealth. 
John MacNeil says there was not left on the surface a ripple to 



44 Life and Labors of 

show where he had taken the last and fatal plunge into the cold 
waters of worldliness; his duties and his interests locked horns. 
His duty was to follow Jesus and his interests said 'don't.' And 
I think that one of the sad stories in eternity will be what a 
failure this man made by holding on to his wealth and refusing 
Jesus Christ. 

"And Jesus entered the city of Jericho and there were two 
noted men lived in the city. One was Bartimseus, the blind 
man, who had been subsisting upon alms, and a friend comes 
along and says to Bartimseus : 'I can see.' 'How did that hap- 
pen?' 'A man named Jesus, who has been opening the eyes of 
the blind, came to our town and I asked him to do that for 
me, and he did,' and I can imagine Bartimseus saying: 'I have 
heard of Jesus, but he has never been to Jericho. But if he 
ever comes near me I am going to be the first to ask him/ 

"Then the friend sees a company of people down the road 
in great excitement and he leaves Bartimseus and runs down 
the road and returns and says : 'I have good news. It is Jesus 
Christ and he is come by you.' Bartimseus rises and begins to 
cry: 'Jesus thou Son of David, have mercy on me/ And they 
said to him : 'Hold your peace.' But Jesus said : 'Who called 
to me?' 'Oh, nobody but a blind beggar that has been both- 
ering everybody.' 'You go tell him that I want to see him/ 
And Jesus said to him: 'What wilt thou that I shall do unto 
thee?' 'Lord, that I may receive my sight/ And Jesus said: 
'I will. Go thy way; thy faith hath saved thee/ And he went 
his way, leaping and praising God. 

"Now another noted man lived in that city — Zaccheus — one 
of the subjects of my message tonight. Zaccheus was chief of 
a gang of publicans that made their money by trickery and 
intrigue and skulduggery, and the miserable system of the 
day was largely responsible for it. You remember that the 
Jews were under the Roman government and the system of 
taxation was pernicious, and the Romans required the Jews to 
come into the treasury once a year and bring all the money 
they had saved and put it down on the table and then the 
Roman government knew how much money they had to have 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 45 

and the Jews were required to bring all their money into the 
Temple and put it on the table. It is the only single tax sys- 
tem that I ever heard of in practical force. They taxed them 
once, took all they had and kept all they got. So when a Jew 
came with his money, and put it on the table, he didn't get any 
back. So the Jew was slick, and instead of bringing all, he 
brought only part, and he saved the rest, and the govern- 
ment began to feel the effects of it, and said, 'We must change 
the system.' And they know how to do it. And they said: 
'It takes a Jew to catch a Jew/ So the Romans figured out how 
much money the Jews ought to pay them, and they sold the 
privilege of collecting the taxes to Jews, and then these tax 
gatherers could go out and make the people pay as much money 
as they wanted to. 

"Supposing that I paid $50,000 to the legislature of Illinois 
for the privilege of collecting the taxes here, and I make the 
people pay me $500,000, whatever was left over would be mine. 
And everybody despised these people and Zaccheus was chief 
of the gang that bought the privilege of collecting the taxes 
and had become rich off of other people's money. Zaccheus lived 
in Jericho and Jesus came to town; his desire was to see Jesus. 
Here is a man that is rich in money who wants to see a man that 
is rich in popularity. Now Zaccheus was short of stature and 
could not see over the heads of the people in the crowd. If 
Roosevelt or Bryan should come to Decatur we would all turn 
out to see them, and if short we could not see over the heads 
of the people. 

"So everybody had been talking about Jesus and cussing and 
discussing him, and probably writing editorials about him. He 
had his friends and his enemies, and Zaccheus was among others 
and the streets were thronged and he saw the route that Jesus 
would take down the street and he saw that he must overcome 
the difficulty of not being able to see him. No one ever sought 
to see God that he did not have to overcome difficulties ; to some 
it is pride, to some it is habit, to some it is whisky, and his dif- 
ficulty was that he was short of stature. You have some difficulty, 
and if you want to see Jesus don't be magnifying your difficulty. 



46 Life and Labors of 

But use as much sense as Zaccheus and overcome it. He saw that 
Jesus was to pass by that way and saw that the route that Jesus 
had taken would take him past a famous sycamore tree, and you 
ought to think when you see a funeral that you have got to 
pass that way, that you will be carried out of the house some 
day and that your name will be on the plate of the coffin. 

"So Zaccheus saw that the way that Jesus was going would 
lead him past the famous sycamore tree, and Zaccheus ran around 
the crowd and took a circuitous route and climbed up that syca- 
more tree. There we have the picture of a short, fat, rich Jew 
up a tree. The Bible says that he was short of stature and 
usually short people are corpulent, so he must have been fat. 
And he was rich and a Jew and was up that sycamore tree to 
see Jesus. How did he get there, and what helps were there at 
his command ? Prudence, his intelligence and his reason. What 
were his helpers? His legs and his arms. Every farmer's 
prudence says that you must plow this spring. That is reason 
and his helps are his plows and his horses, arms and legs. We 
have to use prudence and helps that are at our command. To 
get water out of a pump — you are thirsty — there is a pump. You 
go up and use it — that is prudence. What is the help? The 
handle of the pump. There is an electric light. You want light. 
Turn on the switch. There is the telephone. I use common 
sense. I can see it there, but I must take down the receiver and 
call central. Zaccheus used prudence or in other words com- 
mon sense, and a lot of you fellows have legs and can run to 
the Devil and to the grog shop and to the bawdy house and you 
ought to pray to God for legs to take you down this aisle. 

"Now Jesus saw Zaccheus and Jesus sees every man that is 
trying to get a glimpse of Him. He sees the struggle that you 
are making to overcome your habits and doubts and infidelity. 
Now notice what He said. Jesus walked under the tree and 
looked up and said to Zaccheus. 'Make haste and come down, 
for today I must abide at your house/ That was the reason 
for the command. He wanted to dine with Zaccheus. He was 
honoring the most unpopular men of the day, and I can see 
Zaccheus coming down the tree and saying, 'How do you do, 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 47 

Master? If I had thought that you would go up to my house 
for dinner, I would have had my auto here for you.' 

"And I can hear Jesus say: 'Well, Zack, that is all right, 
never mind.' So down the road they started. 

"I have often tried to imagine what kind of a woman Mrs. 
Zaccheus was. I can imagine that the children were playing in 
the yard and saw their father coming home, and ran in and said, 
'Oh, ma, here comes pa, with a lot of men.' Well, that was 
nothing unusual, for there were no hotels. And Zaccheus was 
popular and well known and every man that came to town they 
entertained them. Now Jesus had invited himself up to the 
house. But that was no breach of etiquette. In those days every- 
body was honored to have some one go to their house for dinner. 
Now the custom has changed. So I can imagine the children say- 
ing : 'There comes pa with a lot of men,' and then I can imagine 
Mrs. Zaccheus hurrying around and saying, 'Here, you put those 
things out of the way, and out with those chairs where they be- 
long,' and then she hurried to fix up her hair, and in comes 
Zaccheus with Jesus. 

"And he says: 'Wife, this is Jesus of Nazareth.' And she 
acknowledges the introduction, and then John, and Peter, and 
Matthew, and Bartholomew are introduced in turn. And she 
says, 'Sit down, gentlemen.' I don't doubt that they did that. 
Jesus didn't go up there to eat the grub that the rich Jew could 
set before Him, but after He had eaten His dinner He got up 
and started for Jerusalem and said to Zaccheus, 'This day hath 
salvation come to thine house.' Little did Zaccheus imagine what 
honor had come to him by having Jesus as his guest. Little do 
you realize or you would take Him to live beneath your roof. 
Little do you realize or you would honor yourself by being a 
Christian. 

"Now Jesus had said to Zaccheus: 'Make haste and come 
down.' Here was the rich young ruler, and Jesus. Two young 
men at a climax. One a young man who had all that the world 
could give — rich, young and a ruler — and here was a young fel- 
low that didn't have two coats to his back. And the rich young 
ruler wanted what the other young fellow had. This young man, 



48 Life and Labors of 

Jesus, had peace with God, and salvation. And this young man 
said to Jesus : 'What must I do to get what you have ?' Jesus 
said : 'I have something you have not, and never will have, and 
if you want the best you have got to come and get what I have.' 

"All your money, and your culture, and education, on God 
Almighty's dirt will never give you peace. But Jesus Christ 
can do it: This rich young ruler said : 'What good thing must 
I do to get what you have?' He had money, education, and he 
was a ruler. But that was not the best. It won't satisfy you, and 
it didn't him. What must you do to get what Jesus has ? Some 
sit there with money, and with a farm of a quarter section, or 
a section of black dirt in Macon county, worth $175 per acre. 
You sit there and your name is honored, but it is not satisfac- 
tion. What have you got to do to get the best that there is? 
There is only one source to go to and that is Jesus. 

"And Jesus said to Zaccheus, 'Make haste and come down/ 
I find people make haste to get rich, or to be elected to some little 
good-for-nothing political office, and they make haste to drink 
and to lie and to blacken character ; which, after it is done, what 
does it amount to ? Make haste — yes, in four weeks some of you 
have not made haste to get right with Jesus. And, yes, forty 
years, and you are still unsaved. A friend of mine was preach- 
ing in Saginaw, Michigan, and a man dropped into the meeting 
and sat on a rear seat, and when the invitation was given that 
man was among the first to come to the front, and he accepted' 
Christ as his Saviour. Later on Doctor Chapman went to De- 
troit to hold a series of meetings and was having a men's meet- 
ing, and asked this man, who was Colonel O. T. Bliss, to come 
over and help him. And asked him to give his testimony. Every 
man in the audience knew him either personally or by reputation, 
and the colonel stood up and said something like this : 

" 'I was born in a Christian home, and when the war broke 
out I enlisted, and my mother begged me to yield to Jesus before 
I went to the war. But I said when the war is over there will 
be time.' He went as a private and came out a colonel and 
still he said no, to God. And then he said: 'If I could only 
become rich I would serve God/ And he became a millionaire, 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 49 

but he still said no to God. Then he said: 'If I could only 
represent this district in the lower house in Washington.' And 
he represented the Saginaw district for two years. But still he 
said no to God. And he said: 'Men, if you want to know the 
best time, it is now.' No, the best time was yesterday, or the day 
before that. The best time was the day when you knew right 
from wrong. But you have passed that up. So now is the best 
time to get right. Make haste and do it now, for the glory of 
God, and the salvation of your soul. What did Zaccheus do when 
he came down the tree ? Did he draw up in all his little dignity and 
say, 'Why, Jesus, you don't know who I am. I am Zaccheus, the 
richest man in this town. I wish that you would honor yourself 
and come to dinner with me.' 

"No ; he began ^to talk about restitution. Notice how quick his 
conscience pricks him in the presence of somebody respectable. 
I have had men say to me, 'Why, my wife is a Presbyterian, or my 
mother is a Methodist.' Yes, but what about you? You dig up 
something to kind of connect you with God. Jesus said, 'Make 
haste and come down.' And Zaccheus slid down the tree and 
said, 'Half of my goods I give to the poor.' 

Jesus didn't ask him about charity. Then Zaccheus said : 'And 
if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation I will 
restore four-fold.' He knew when he stood in the presence of 
Jesus he had to begin to clean up. His conscience pricked him, 
and he began to think about the kind of life that he had lived. He 
spoke of restitution. Say, a lot of you men in town will have to 
write a check to pay back the man that you have skinned. A lot 
of you fellows will have to go down and draw on your surplus, 
and if you will only give back a lot of the money that you have, 
that is dirty, and which you got from widows and orphans, I tell 
you, you miserable scoundrel, you would not have as much as you 
have. But don't you forget it, God will square it up in the day of 
judgment. 

"I would not have the dirty money of the saloon keeper, or the 
gambler, gotten with the tears of widows and the blood of orphans. 
I would not have the old money of the Pabst and Schlitz, and the 
Anheuser Busch, and the Decatur Brewery or any of the rest of 

4 



50 Life and Labors of 

them. I would not have it. There is a brand of whisky which 
says, That's all.' No, that is not all! There is murder, and 
degradation, and sorrow, and tears, and anguish, and blighted 
lives and homes and hopes. That is not all — don't peddle your 
wares with a lie like that. 

"He began to speak about restitution. Some of you business 
men will have to organize your business on a new basis. There 
are some things that you will have to cut out. In Akron the 
Adams Express company missed a package containing $20,000 in 
greenbacks and the Pinkerton men searched everywhere and they 
finally arrested a young clerk on suspicion. But the evidence 
was only circumstantial and he was acquitted although they were 
positive that he took it, and everybody that followed the case was 
convinced that he was the thief, although they could not convict 
him. So he left and wandered up and down the country, and one 
night he wandered into Farwell Hall and heard Moody preach, 
and Moody said something about making the past right. And 
after the meeting the young fellow said: T want to talk with 
you,' and Moody said : Tf it is an argument I have not time to 
talk to you, but if it is confession I will give you one minute.' And 
the young fellow told him and said : 'What shall I do ?' Moody 
said : 'The only thing to do is to go back and to give that money 
to the express company.' 'But they will send me to the peniten- 
tiary.' 'Well, that is where you ought to be. Go back like a man.' 

"So he went back and he had only spent $600 of the money and 
some friends made that up, and he put it with the rest which he 
had hidden and walked into the Adams Express company's office 
and laid the money down, and said : T did steal it.' They said : 
'We cannot try you a second time on the same charge/ But they 
figured out another charge against him, and sent him to the peni- 
tentiary for three years. And when he walked behind the prison 
bars he was a free man for the first time. His conduct was so 
good, that he was pardoned after a year and he died in a little 
while. But before he died, he won his father, and brother, and 
sister, for Christ. It is not a question of what a man has been 
or is, if he is only willing to turn from it. God says, T will for- 
give and blot it out.' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 51 

"Zaccheus climbed the tree with no other desire than to see 
Jesus. Just to gratify his curiosity. A lot of you people come 
here out of curiosity. You hear a lot of things and imagine that 
I have horns on my head, and a great long tail with a fish hook 
on the end. But I am out of the same kind of stuff that you are. 
But you just drop in out of curiosity. So, if I thought I was 
doing nothing more than gratifying the curiosity of people I 
would pack my trunk and take the midnight train for Chicago to- 
night. I was preaching in a town in Iowa and a fellow went into 
a saloon to get a drink and threw down a dime for a glass of 
whisky, and the barkeeper was cussing me and if the enmity and 
hatred that rankled in his heart had been injected into his stomach 
he would have died of black vomit in two minutes. 

"The fellow said, 'Have you been up to see Bill ?' 'No, by the 

, I am not going to hear that .' 

And the fellow said : 'Well, I have not been up myself, but there 
must be something going on, Dick, if he can stir you up at this 
distance/ And he picked up his dime and left the drink of 
whisky and came to hear me. He didn't hear what the saloon- 
keeper said that he would, but he sat and listened and said : 'That 
is right, what he says/ And the fifth night he was on his knees. 
That fellow had drunk whisky enough to float a battleship and 
all the money that he had made in seventeen years had gone into 
the till of the whisky gang. He was elected chairman of the civic 
federation and cleaned things up for Jesus. Zaccheus climbed the 
tree to gratify the curiosity of seeing a popular man and when 
Jesus bade him good-bye. He said, 'This day hath salvation come 
to your house/ 

"Pride ! Some of you people haven't come down here because 
you are too proud. That is what is the matter with some of you 
church members. You know you have been living like the Devil, 
and you are too proud to come down and take your stand for 
Jesus Christ and you know you can't be saved and keep company 
with that saloonkeeper, although your name is on the church 
record. Why haven't you been down? Because you are too 
proud to walk down here and get right. There is something in 
religion that you haven't got, although you are a church member. 
You are too proud to do it. 



52 Life and Labors of 

"Too proud! Too proud! Too proud! Too proud to go! 
'Pride goeth before a fall.' A haughty spirit before destruction. 
I tell you, you are afraid, you are afraid of the horse laugh that 
some of that dirty rotten gang would give you if you walked down 
and took a stand for Jesus Christ. You are afraid of some of the 
blear-eyed, whisky-soaked scoundrels in this town who are going 
around and threatening and intimidating those who take their 
stand for Jesus Christ. You get cold feet. If some of those old 
degenerates in this town don't want to go to heaven, then keep 
your hands off of those who do. If you want to go to hell, go to 
hell, and the quicker you get there the better it is for Decatur. I 
tell you this thing of trying to brow-beat men who want to be 
decent and men who want to please God and to make their wives 
and children happy and who want to stoop down in the name of 
the Son of God and wipe the stain off of their family name, you 
keep your hands off. 

"It is the fear of man. There isn't a man in Decatur that is 
worth speaking to, worth buying one dollar's worth of goods 
from that would sneer if you take your stand for Jesus Christ. I 
tell you it would be a manly thing to do, and if anybody laughs 
at you or sneers at you because you do it is the lowest down. [ Mr. 
Sunday picked up a chair, swung it above his head, and crashed 
it over the pulpit.] Do not fear man. You may call that right- 
eous indignation ; it is pure old mad. 

"What did Zaccheus care about what the bunch would say 
because he climbed up a tree to see Jesus? What did he care if 
they laughed at him, and went around saying, 'Zaccheus went out 
and climbed a tree to see some crazy, long-haired old fanatic from 
Nazareth who calls himself the Son of God.' 

"I can imagine all the comments that were going on about Jesus. 
Down from your sin. That is the reason in your heart that you 
won't drop that sin, you won't give up that sin, that is the rea- 
son. If you want to see Jesus, you will have to drop that sin, 
and you will gaze at a vision of him. 

"The Son of Man is come. There is some reason why to me, 
why he did not say the Son of God. There is an awful feeling in 
his heart if an unsaved fellow thinks about God. Why shouldn't 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 53 

there be? Couldn't God Almighty speak and every one of us 
drop dead in a minute? Couldn't he blow his breath and make 
the world chaos and ruin? Couldn't he withdraw his power 
and this old planet would slip her moorings and drop out of her 
orbit? Why shouldn't there be? 

"Supposing I should jump off of this platform and walk down 
this aisle and across here and back across there, and put on my 
coat and turn to the ministers and say, 'I have lost something.' 
They would have a right to say two things about me. 'What you 
have lost did not amount to much and did not have much value ; 
and you don't care much whether you find it or not.' But sup- 
pose I hire fifty men and rake up all the sawdust in this room and 
pile it in piles and sift it and look through every particle of it, 
and hire you and pay you two or three dollars apiece to do it, 
then you have a right to say two things about me. 'What I lost 
had great value, and second, you are doing your utmost trying 
to find it.' 

"All right, I tell you your souls have a great value. You can 
see what God thought of them when God gave Jesus Christ, His 
only begotten son to come down and seek and save you. That is 
the price God puts upon it. He sent His only son into the world 
to come and seek and save. Two locomotives on the same track 
and they were sent out in the same direction, one going with the 
speed of the wind and the other going with the proverbial slow- 
ness of a snail ; the one behind would never catch the other, but 
if you put two engines on the same track and start one for 'Frisco 
and the other for New York it would not be long until they would 
meet; you seek Jesus Christ and it won't be long until you will 
find Him for He is seeking you ; He is seeking sinners. It would 
not take you forty winters, nor forty hours, nor forty seconds, if 
you were seeking Jesus Christ for you to be saved. 

"He has been seeking some of you for five years ; some ten, 
fifteen, twenty-five, forty, fifty and seventy years, and you haven't 
found Him yet, because you are not seeking Him. You have your 
back towards Him; you are lost. He came to seek and to save 
the lost. You are lost, you are lost. Say, if you thought you 
were lost, you would give ten thousand worlds like this to have 
that chance back again. 



54 Life and Labors of 

"A friend of mine told me he stood on the beach and watched 
the storm raging. It beat the old waves mountain high. A 
ship was going to pieces on the outer reefs on the outer bars. He 
said they brought out the live saving boats and launched them, 
and the wind and the waves beat them back. Eight times they 
tried, and every time they were beaten back. Then they brought 
out the cannon and fired the rope. The wind was so strong that it 
fell short. They tried that fifteen times and it fell short. They 
stood there helpless and watched man after man washed from the 
deck into the sea until only one remained. They stood looking 
through a glass. They made out an object holding to the mast 
of the ship. They heard a faint voice above the roar of the 
waves crying, 'Lost! Lost!' When the old ship rolled in the 
trough of the sea and rose again they looked and the mast was 
empty and the lifeless body soon drifted upon the beach. I wish 
God Almighty could make men realize that they are lost, and like 
that poor, stranded sailor cry out, 'Lost ! Lost !' 

"He came to seek and to save. I have got two regrets in my 
life. Well, there are lots of them, but two that are pre-eminent ; 
one is that I have never heard Spurgeon preach a sermon and the 
other is that I have never heard Ole Bull play a violin. Without 
Jesus Christ you are lost. I tell you you are happier when you 
are saved. I used to walk up to the cashier's window and draw 
my salary every two weeks. I played baseball, and have never 
heard anybody call me a grafter, and I was pulling in $500 or 
$600 a month amusing the people on the diamond. I suppose if 
I had quit playing baseball and gone into the saloon business or 
tooted for some gambling hell, or made books on the races, I 
might have been a cracking good fellow with a lot of you fellows 
that are knocking me. There never was a man that came to De- 
catur that had more loyal friends, nor more bitter enemies than 
I have. 

"You know what they said about Grover Cleveland, we admire 
him for the enemies he has made. Ditto. 

"It is said that Ericsson and Ole Bull were boys together. 
Ericsson became a world famous inventor and Ole Bull a famous 
musician. Ole Bull when he came to New York to give a concert 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday. 55 

went to his old friend, Ericsson, and said, 'John, I want you to 
come and hear me play tonight.' And he said to him, 'No, I will 
not come.' 'Oh, you must come and hear me play.' 'Well,' he 
said, 'I would if I wanted to hear anybody play, but I don't care 
for music. I won't come.' And he said, 'John, you must come, 
here are some tickets. I will look for you when I walk out on the 
stage to play. Don't disappoint me.' Ole Bull walked out on 
the stage and looked and the seats were empty. The next day 
he went down to the factory and said, 'John, you weren't there last 
night.' 'No,' he said, 'I told you I would not come.' He said, 
'See here, John, if you don't come down and hear me play, I will 
come here and play for you.' Ericsson said, 'Don't you bring 
your riddle in here, Ole, I don't care for it.' 

"But he came with his violin and they talked about tones and 
sharps and flats and bars and measures and about all the musical 
terms. And he said, 'John, see here, I will show you how it is 
worked.' And he rosined his bow and strung his violin and 
started to play. He could make it sing like a nightingale, he could 
make it sob like a child, he could make it weep like a strong man 
in agony and he could make it groan like a dying horse. 

"He played and the men in the factory stopped work, dropped 
their tools and came in groups and formed a circle around Ole 
Bull and they listened and listened. Ericsson stood on the outer 
circle. Soon he was seen fighting and elbowing his way among 
the men and he stopped right in front of him and he looked and 
listened. Presently Ole Bull stopped and the men heaved a sigh 
of relief and turned back to their work. Ericsson stood still with 
tears trickling down his cheeks and he said: 'Play on, play on. 
I never knew what was lacking in my life before. It is music. 
Play on, Ole, play on.' 

"You don't know, do you ?" 



56 Life and Labors of 



Twenty-third Psalm. 

"Next to John 3 :i6 it is more familiar than any other passage 
of scripture. Some 3,000 years have passed away since David 
wrote this psalm. The harp on which he used to play to charm 
old King Saul when he was melancholy, the book of the law, 
out of which he read, the giant walls which defended Jerusalem, 
the palace in which he lived, and the throne upon which he sat, 
have all crumbled away, yet the psalm is as sweet and inspiring 
as it was the day he penned it. Little children have repeated it 
at their mother's knee, and I haven't the slightest doubt that the 
infant Jesus used to say it over and over. It has been a source 
of inspiration in the days of trouble and the chains of the prison- 
ers have snapped as they said, 'The Lord is my shepherd.' From 
the cell to the mountain top, men have found inspiration in this 
psalm, and have looked into the face of God, whom having not 
seen, they love. And looking into His face, old men, and young 
men, and maidens, have pillowed their heads upon his breast, 
and received inspiration as they neared the grave. 

"In Freeport, Illinois, Father Chapin lay dying. A good friend 
asked him if he knew him, and he said, 'No, what is your name ?' 
And then he said, 'How easily I forget.' When he was passing 
away at 2 o'clock in the morning, his daughter, Ruth, spoke to 
him, and asked him if he knew her, and he said : 'Oh, no, I never 
had a child.' Then they asked him if he knew Jesus Christ, and 
he leaped up with a halo of glory about him and said, 'Yes, I have 
preached His gospel for forty-five years. Yes, Jesus walks with 
us through the valley and the shadow.' 

"Some one has called it the creed psalm. A man stood up and 
said : T made the psalm my creed twenty-seven years ago. I do 
not understand it all, in fact I am just learning the ABC out 
of which to coin the blessings which have accrued to me.' 

"This may be called the ministerial psalm. It goes swinging 
and singing through life. It makes men and women forget their 
sorrow, it charms away their grief. It drives out sinful thoughts, 
it snaps the chains of the prisoners. It sets the drunkard free; 
it lures the gambler from his den; it woos the libertine and the 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 57 

fallen woman to purity, and leads infidels to pray. It will go 
singing and swinging up and down the earth until it accomplishes 
its message and then like a weary dove it will return to the throne 
of God, no more to wander. 

"Another man called it the psalm of the lark. Not that bird, 
our common meadow lark, but the English song bird. It never 
sings except when it is on the wing, and it is said, the higher it 
gets the sweeter the melody until it passes from vision. There 
was a man living in Detroit who was called to England by the 
serious illness of his mother and then she passed away. As they 
stood by the open grave a bevy of larks flew out of the shrubbery 
and the higher they soared the sweeter the song until those who 
stood there forgot their tears, as they looked off into illimitable 
space. You have stood by the grave of some of your loved ones 
where you have buried your ambition, your virtue, your manhood, 
and your womanhood, and your loved ones slipped beyond the 
unknown. But we believe in the resurrection life, and that they 
have entered into the joy of their Lord. David wrote this psalm 
probably that it might be sung in the temple, or that he might 
sing it to King Saul, and if he did write it, and sing it as a song 
we may be sure that he would place this emphasis on the personal 
pronouns for everything that David said in that psalm had been 
forged on the anvil of experience. 

" 'He maketh me to lie down in green pastures/ There was a 
Persian monarch who had come up from very humble circum- 
stances. He had been a shepherd and in his throne room he had 
erected a shepherd's room. In it were the rocks and the trees 
and the shepherd's crook and everything as far as possible as it 
had been in his boyhood days. And he used to go and look every 
day upon these things, so that he might follow out Kipling's 
thought, 'Lest we forget,' and that he might be humble and not 
get puffed up. 

"What a low down, degenerate outcast you would be without 
Jesus Christ. You would not want to live in Decatur if it were 
not for the religion of Jesus Christ, without which the church 
property would not be worth ten cents on the dollar in this city. 
And you blackened infidel, everything of an ennobling and re- 



58 Life and Labors of 

straining influence is due to Jesus. You go home and sit down 
and take a retrospective view of the past, and introspective view 
of your life, and a prospective view of your life, and see where 
you lost out, and if you are a man, and come to him, he will 
make your future a grand song for Jesus Christ. 

The proposition of it is significant, it follows the twenty-second 
psalm, which has been called by some the psalm of the cross. 'The 
Lord is my Shepherd.' He is not if you are not a Christian, and 
if you say it you lie. I am a sinner, I accept Jesus as my saviour, 
then the Lord is my shepherd. It is followed by the twenty- 
fourth psalm, the psalm of the future life. 'Lift up your heads, 
Oh, ye gates ; be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors ; and the king 
of glory shall come in/ So the twenty-third psalm is the psalm 
of every day life the psalm of common everyday experience. And 
though we were as rich as Crcesus, or John D. Rockefeller, we 
are not saved without Jesus Christ. 

"I read the other day of a boy who learned under great diffi- 
culty. A colporteur was traveling through Switzerland, and he 
found this boy living in very meager circumstances, who was 
willing to learn, but was very dull. He gave him a Bible, and 
told him : Tf you will commit the 23d psalm to memory, when I 
return I will give you a present.' T went back/ he said, 'after 
some months and rang the door bell. A woman in black came to 
the door. I asked for the boy, and she answered with tears, "He 
died a month ago, but he said to tell you he learned the psalm 
before he died. He would say 'the Lord' and hold up one finger, 
'is my/ two fingers, 'shepherd,' three fingers." ' 

"Hold to that ; not your culture, your education, nor your money 
can dispel the gloom. 'The Lord is my shepherd' — that will pull 
you through. 

" 'The Lord is my shepherd.' The shepherd sits on an emi- 
nence and overlooks the sheep. Out in Iowa in an early day lived 
an old Scotch shepherd, named Father Duff. He used to sit on 
the crown of the hill and smoke, and watch his sheep, and when 
his eye got dim he would use a field glass through which to watch 
their wanderings, and when they went too far away he would call 
his collie dog to his side, and say: 'Sis, they are too far away, 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 59 

go drive them back.' I believe God the Father was overlooking 
Decatur and He saw your wanderings in business, and politics, 
and after the phantoms of pleasure, you deserted the prayer meet- 
ing for the card party, and God Almighty has sent this tabernacle 
as a sort of a shepherd dog to bring you back to the church. To 
many a man God has to back up a white hearse to the door, or it 
might be a black one, and put crepe on the door to make you 
think, and these things may be the shepherd dog to turn your 
minds to things eternal. 

"Many a time I have seen that old man go home at night with 
a lamb under his arm, but never an old sheep. He was solicitous 
for the weak. A minister was preaching in a certain place and a 
man said to him, 'Will you come to my house and break bread; 
I haven't invited a stranger there for seventeen years, but some- 
thing in your sermon made me think that you would come. My 
wife and I are proud. We have an imbecile son and we never 
thought it was pleasant for strangers.' They ate dinner, they 
brought this boy to the table and fed him. Although 21 years of 
age, he was entirely helpless. The minister asked if he had always 
been that way. The man answered no, that he was bright until 
four years of age, then he had a malady that put him in that 
comatose state. 'We thought he would die.' And the minister 
said: 'Perhaps it would have been better.' 'You couldn't have 
said anything that hurt me worst than that, and if our boy could 
only have his mind long enough to thank us and to say that he 
had appreciated what we had done, we would feel repaid a thou- 
sand fold for the trouble for our boy,' was the reply. 

"I tell you I believe that if some of you men would only walk 
down here and take your stand for Jesus Christ that he would 
feel repaid for the nail prints in his hand, for the stonings, and 
for the spittle that was cast upon him. If you were only man 
or woman enough to acknowledge your debt of gratitude to Jesus 
Christ, he would feel repaid for the sacrifice that he made. 

" 'He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me 
beside the still waters.' A hungry sheep will never lie down, and 
when they do lie down it is because they are satisfied. I never 
could understand why God's people had to leave good clover 



6o Life and Labors of 

pasture and go up into alleys with the goats and chew rags and 
tin cans. What is the matter that you leave the pastures of the 
Lord and go up after the novel and the world, the flesh and the 
Devil? 

"Helen Hunt Jackson tells about going along the streets of 
Colorado Springs one rainy, snowy fall day and she saw a little 
girl standing in front of the milliner's store looking through the 
window at the fall styles ; and there were ribbons and bows and 
plumes of every color, and as she stood there her little legs bare, 
her lips blue from the cold, a basket on her arms with scraps from 
some restaurant, heedless of the passers by she said : 'I choose 
that color, and that and that and that.' She shied as Miss Jackson 
came near. 'And,' says the writer, 'I said, "hold on, honey, don't 
go." When I went on I left a coin in her hands. After going 
some blocks I came back again and found her standing there, 
ankle deep in the water, her face close to the window, and she 
said, "I choose that color, and that color, and that color, and that 
color, and that color." ' 

"This Lord is my shepherd and I choose him and you can take 
the world if you want. You can take the free lunch counter 
if you want — 'the Lord is my shepherd.' 

" 'He restoreth my soul.' How often we need physical restora- 
tion. So we need renovation morally. I give you doses of epicac 
and rock salt and dynamite. You have been swallowing booby 
prizes and ball room costumes and beer and champagne and you 
need cleaning out and you need to get right with God. What are 
the causes of our declension? Unconfessed sin. Some years 
ago I told Helen not to do a certain thing and she did it, and I 
told her again not to do it and if she did I would punish her. I 
was led to believe that she disobeyed me, and I punished her. 
But I found afterwards that I was mistaken and something said 
to me that I ought to tell Helen that I had done wrong, but I 
said she had forgotten all about it by this time, but she hadn't. 
And so one day I heard her playing in the other room, 'drop the 
handkerchief,' 'tag' and 'London bridge is falling down,' so I 
called her and I said, 'Helen, when I punished you the other day 
I did wrong, and I want you to forgive me,' and she put her 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 61 

arms about my neck and I knew that I hadn't lost my influence 
over her. 

" 'Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me.' I told George one 
night to go down stairs and get something for me and he said : 
'Pa, did you leave the gas burning?' and I said, 'No, George, 
why?' 'Oh,' he said, 'Pa, it is dark down there and I am afraid.' 
And I said, 'Oh, shucks, George, there won't anything hurt you.' 
And he said: 'Pa, were you ever afraid when you were a little 
boy?' And I said, 'You bet, George; I could beat Maud S. 
going past a graveyard after dark.' 'Pa, that is just the way I 
feel. I am afraid something will jump out and grab me.' So I 
went down with him and lighted the gas and said, 'Now, son, 
are you afraid ?' And he said : 'No, Pa, you are with me.' And 
so when we come to the graveyard where the lodge stops and 
the nurse must stop, and wife and husband, that is where God 
comes in and goes all the way with us. 

" 'And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever/ 

"I should like to die like Cruden did. He had the habit when 
weary, of putting his face in the open Bible which he had been 
studying and there going to sleep, and one day they came and 
found him sleeping the sleep of death with his face in his beloved 
Bible. Or, like Livingstone, as they were traveling through the 
wilds of Africa they came to a bungalow, and he said: 'Let me 
rest here,' and they put him into the rude bed and they went to 
look in an hour and found him on his knees and he had been 
praying for sin cursed Africa, and his life had gone out. And 
those rude natives embalmed his body and carried it to the coast 
and it was taken to England and he sleeps there in Westminster 
Abbey. Oh, I would like to die like that, pleading for the souls 
of others. 

" 'Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of 
my life and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.' " 



62 Life and Labors of 



Choose ye this day whom ye will serve. — 
Joshua 24 :16. 

"These are the words of Joshua, successor of Moses, both great 
men, but great in a different sense, both great because of the 
peculiar work assigned to them and the magnificent way they 
did it. Moses was a great organizer. Moses took a great horde 
of people that had been for years in Egyptian bondage and out 
of them molded the greatest nation the world has ever known. 
The Jew is the same today that he was 6,000 years ago, and if 
the world stands 6,000 years longer he will be the same at the 
end of that time. 

"It makes my blood boil to hear a man speak of the Jew as 
a Sheeney, or Christ killer, because the blood of the Jews flowed 
through that same Christ. If you are kept out of hell it will be 
because of the fact of the offering that came through the repre- 
sentation of that nation. Don't you know that there are fewer 
Jews among the criminals than any other nation of people? A 
judge recently sentenced a member of the Hebrew race and he 
said to him : 'You are the first Jew that has ever come before me 
in the twenty-seven years that I have been on the bench/ You 
never see a Jew hobo or a 'Weary Willie.' A Jew never pan- 
handles you for the price of a meal. The Jews are the money 
lenders of the world. The Jews are the shrewdest financiers in 
the world and the crowned heads of Europe pay tribute to the 
Jews. 

"Moses took the Jews out of Egyptian bondage and molded 
them into the greatest nation in the world. Other nations have 
been lost by marrying and inter -marrying, but not the Jews. 
Moses had done the work and when they had buried him, 
Joshua took it up. I want to appeal to you this afternoon through 
your manhood if I can, and I am sure that I can. I never met a 
more manly lot of men and a more womanly lot of women than 
I have met in Decatur, never in my life. I want to appeal to 
your manhood. 

"Somebody defines man as a rational animal. I don't know 
whether that is a good definition or not. I know that God has 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 63 

given every man reason and he expects you to use it. A horse 
is not a rational animal ; a hog is not a rational animal, yet 
a hog knows a pen, and a horse knows the stable. Then why 
doesn't man know what is best for him? A horse is not a 
reasoning animal, yet some horses can give some men pointers 
when it comes to horse sense. 

"A man must be a moral idiot that doesn't see that it is reason- 
able to be a sinner. It is only reasonable to do what is right 
and serve God. You know avoirdupois don't make a man. Man 
isn't a man because he measures five feet, eleven or six feet. 
He isn't a man because he can tip the scales at 200 or 250 
pounds. That don't constitute manhood. Some of the manliest 
men that I have ever met were men that were giants, and some 
of the most good-for-nothing, God-forsaken, iniquitous degener- 
ates I ever knew in my life were men that were giants physically. 

"On the other hand some of the best men that I have ever 
known were men of frail stature ; Napoleon was short of stature ; 
Alexander the Great was of short stature ; Pope Leo was so 
small he would almost blow away, he was so frail of stature. 
Some of the grandest men that the world has ever known were 
men that were weak physically. On the other hand some of the 
most good-for-nothing, God-forsaken, poltroons and moral per- 
verts I have ever met this side of the pit of hell have been men 
of small stature. Avoirdupois don't make the man, and it doesn't 
constitute manhood. 

"I tell you character makes manhood. Alexander H. Stephens 
as vice president of the Confederate states was a man of frail 
stature and during his last term in the United States senate he 
used to be wheeled in on an invalid's chair. The newspapers 
used to make comments like this: 'An empty carriage drove 
up in front of the White House and Alexander Stephens got out.' 
Although he was so frail in stature, Stephens was a terror in 
debate. The senators all dreaded to cross swords or lock horns 
with him. He was vindictive and unrelenting. They were dis- 
cussing some bill in the senate one time and a senator from 
Georgia was on one side and Stephens was on the other. Stephens 
said something in retort that made the Georgia senator mad. He 



64 Life and Labors of 

walked up to the invalid's chair that Stephens was in and doubled 
up his fist and said, 'I could eat you.' Stephens said, 'If you 
did you would have more brains in your belly than you have 
got in your head.' The senator tried to hedge and said, 'Well, 
I am a self-made man; I haven't had the opportunities that you 
have.' Stephens said, 'That relieves God of a wonderful re- 
sponsibility/ 

"In Jesus Christ I get a revelation of a man. Jesus came into 
the world not only to reveal God to man but Jesus came to reveal 
you to yourself, and me to myself. And in Jesus Christ I have 
a revelation in manhood, and in Jesus Christ I get an idea of the 
kind of man God wants you to be, and the kind of man God wants 
me to be. And it is only by striving to be that kind of a man 
that you are decent. Only when you are striving to do what God 
wants you to be is it that you are a man. 

"I meet a great many men that give an excuse for not being 
a Christian, but I never have met a man that could give me a 
reason. I met a fellow in Troy, N. Y., that came nearer giving 
me a reason than any man that I have ever met. I walked up to 
the young fellow, who was about 30 years of age, and I said: 
'Are you a Christian?' He said, 'No, sir.' 'Do you believe that 
Jesus Christ is the Son of God?' 'Yes, sir.' 'Do you believe 
that the Bible is the word of God?' 'Yes, sir.' 'Do you believe 
if you accept Jesus Christ that you will be saved?' 'Yes, sir.' 
'Do you believe in heaven and hell ?' T do/ 'Do you believe that 
if you accept Jesus Christ you will be saved and that if you 
don't you will go to hell ? Do you believe that if you repent that 
God will save you?' 'I do/ 'Then take my hand and tell me 
that you will be a Christian. Why are you not a Christian ?' He 
looked at me and said, 'Mr. Sunday, to be honest with you, I 
am not man enough to be a Christian/ 

"Do you know why some of you men haven't been down here ? 
It is because you are afraid and are not man enough to walk down 
here in the open and accept Jesus Christ. I tell you men of 
Decatur, you are not man enough to be a Christian; you are 
man enough to go into business ; you are man enough to go into 
lodge; you are man enough to go into politics; but you are not 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 65 

man enough to be a Christian. You haven't got manhood enough 
to walk down the aisle and take my hand and say, 'I will give 
my heart to Jesus Christ/ 

"You haven't got manhood enough to come down here, and 
go home and say to your wife, 'I have given my heart to Jesus 
Christ.' You haven't manhood enough to take my hand and go 
home and put your arms around your wife and tell her, 'I have 
yielded to Jesus Christ.' You haven't manhood enough to come 
and take my hand and go home to your sister and say to her: 
'You will never be ashamed of me any more, I have given my 
heart to Jesus Christ.' 

"You haven't manhood enough to come and take my hand and 
then go to that girl you have asked to be your wife and tell her 
that you have yielded to Jesus Christ. You haven't manhood 
enough to take my hand and go home and call your wife and 
children into the parlor and take down the old family Bible and 
read a verse and get down and pray. You haven't got man- 
hood enough to let them hear your voice in prayer. You haven't 
got manhood enough to come here and take my hand and say to 
the first man that crosses the threshold of your store, 'I have ac- 
cepted Jesus Christ.' You haven't got manhood enough to call 
in your clerks and say, 'I have given my heart to Jesus Christ.' 
You haven't manhood enough to say to the members of your 
lodge, the Elks, the Odd Fellows, the Masons, the Knights of 
Pythias, the Woodmen — you haven't manhood enough to say to 
them, 'Men, I have given my heart to Jesus Christ.' You haven't 
manhood enough to be a Christian. 

"It takes manhood to be a Christian, and you haven't manhood 
enough to do it. It don't take manhood to drink, it takes man- 
hood to be sober. It don't take manhood to cuss ; it takes man- 
hood to pray. Many a fellow today would like to be called a 
manly man, but how many fool ideas some of you have as to 
what constitutes manhood. Physical strength is not a test of 
manhood. 

"Intellectuality is no test of manhood. Lord Bacon was ex- 
tolled as a benefactor of the human race. But was he manly 
when as Lord Chancellor, he took a bribe of four hundred 
5 



66 Life and Labors of 






pounds, and he gave decisions in favor of the men that had 
given him the bribe of four hundred pounds? Look at him as 
he was led down the steps of the Tower Hill prison. 

"The church needs you. Some men put a low mark on the 
church. They begrudge everything that they give to the church. 
They dole out a few pennies to the support of the church, and 
yet if your children ever come into virtue and happiness it will 
be through the church. If the church don't get them the world 
will. If the Sunday school don't get them the grog shop will 
and the brothel will. You will wait until you are about to pass 
away and then you will like to see them in the church. When 
you pass away you will like to see them in the care of sacred 
persons. When you pass away you will like to see them sitting 
at the holy sacrament. When you are on your dying bed and 
they lead your little children in to take a last look into your face 
and you look into their bewildered faces, then it is a comfort for 
you to know that they are under the sacred protection of the 
church. And then it would be a comfort for you to know that 
you are dying within the call of that great institution. 

"I want you to come into the church, and I swing the doors 
wide open this afternoon from wall to wall and say, 'Come in, 
boys, come in, we will sing you a song, we will preach you a 
sermon, we will pray a prayer, we will make it worth the trouble.' 
Come in to the greatest institution on the earth. All other institu- 
tions have failed, but the church of God is founded on the Rock 
of Ages, and the charter is everlasting life; the dividend is 
heaven and its president is God. The church stands and the 
church needs you and you need the church. 

"Down in New York City not long ago there was a labor 
meeting and 7,000 men were present. The question was asked 
how many of the men were at church that morning. And twenty- 
two out of that 7,000 present had been to church. In Chicago a 
few years ago the Chicago Record-Herald hired reporters and put 
them in front of every church in Chicago, Catholic, Protestant, 
Christian Science and everything that savored of a church. It 
was a beautiful Sunday in October. The population of Chicago 
then was 1,850,000 and there were in all the churches of all 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 67 

denominations, 375,000 men, women and children, 219,000 Catho- 
lics and 166,000 Protestants. Where were they? I will repeat 
again the church needs you. 

"I am not concerned about it for my sake, but for the sake 
of those, that are not Christians. What will you say when you 
meet God in Judgment? I shall have to give an account for the 
five weeks that I have spent in Decatur; you will have to give 
an account of every hour of your life and every breath you 
breathe. What are you going to say? You have hindered your 
wife from living a Christian life by your indifference to religion. 
You have discouraged your mother and sent her earlier to the 
grave. What are you going to say ? Your influence is not right 
with the lodge members. You are not an inspiration to the men 
with whom you work, or to the community you live in. You are 
harming your wife, your children, the man who sits by your 
side, your business associates. You are harming the people of 
Decatur by refusing to be a God-fearing and Christ-loving person. 

"A young Yale man lay dying in Denver. The father had 
done everything that money could do to save him. He had sent 
for a specialist from Chicago to come on a special train and 
treat him. He went into his son's room one day and said, 'Son, 
is there anything that I can do for you? I will do anything for 
you that money can buy/ He looked at his father and said to 
him, 'Father, pray for me.' The father walked to the window and 
bit his lip until the blood ran down his chin and clinched his fist 
until the nails dug into the flesh. Four days later as he was re- 
turning from the grave of that son he said, T would give all I 
have got, all my gold and silver mining stock if I could call that 
boy back and pray for him as he requested.' 

"I would rather have disease and poverty and all the worst 
that can come to life and be able to say, T know that my Re- 
deemer liveth/ than to have the best that life can give without 
a personal knowledge of Jesus Christ. 

"A man, a college graduate, once told this story of his life. 
He came back home after his graduation and drank and caroused 
and his prodigality sent his mother to the grave. One day his 
father met him on the street of a little town and rebuked him for 



68 Life and Labors of 

being drunk. He cursed him and spat in his face and doubled 
up his fist and in his drunken condition would have felled him 
to the ground but a man caught his arm. 

"His father turned and went to the house and walked out 
through the kitchen into the orchard. His shrieks of agony 
startled the neighborhood and he went back into the house and 
sat down. Presently his son came staggering and reeling up the 
walk. The old father rushed to meet him on the steps and he 
had just started up when he grabbed his son by the shoulders and 
hurled him around. And he said to him, 'I want you to do two 
things and do them now. I want you to leave home and I want 

I you to change your name. Our family name has never been dis- 
graced but by you. You have made us hang our heads in shame, 

! and you have put your mother in the grave, and have turned my 
hair gray. Your sister is ashamed to go out in company. Now 
then leave home and change your name and do it now.' And 
- the father pushed him down the steps and he started out. His 
sister upstairs listened to the commotion and hurried down the 
little pebbled walk and caught her brother at the gate. She 
threw her arms around him and said, 'Brother, good-bye. God 
help you. Every night at 8 o'clock as long as I live, I will be on 
my knees praying for you. Remember, brother.' 

"He started to roam and went from bad to worse and worse. 
He went to Chicago and struck the bottom and took the count. 
He got so low down that they told him not to come back to the 
old barrel house down below the dead line on Clark street. 
They told him not to come to the police station to sleep on the 
stone floor. He couldn't get money to buy poison. He was 
covered all over with vermin. His clothes hung in rags on 
his body. He was stinking. His hair was matted, and his eyes 
were filled with matter and blood shot. One night he started 
for the lake. He went east on Van Buren to Dearborn street 
and as he stood on the corner he heard the clock strike eight. 
He leaned up against a lamp post and wept. A man standing 
near passing out tickets for the Pacific Garden Mission said, 
'What is the matter, pal?' He said, 'My sister is praying for me.' 
He said to him, 'Come in, we will help you. Walk in.' He 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 69 

walked in and when the invitation was given he went up and 
dropped to his knees and accepted Jesus Christ. They watched 
him a couple of weeks and gave him everything to do that they 
could. They told him to write home and tell his father what he 
had done. They said, 'Don't ask him for money, for he will 
think you are working a game on him and trying to con him 
out of some money. Just tell him what you have done/ 

"He wrote home and said, 'Father, I am going to make you 
proud of me yet. When I come back you will be proud to 
receive me, and sister will be proud to walk and ride with me 
in the family carriage.' They said to him that he was not sincere 
and that they had paid him to do it. He said, 'Yes, I am paid. 
Sin drove me away from home, and Jesus Christ is sending me 
back. I have been well paid.' His father sent him a check 
for $50 and told him to get some clothes and hurry home. 
Waiting back in that little town in Ohio were his father and 
sister. 

"Yes, I am well paid. That is what it does to serve God, and 
keep his commandments. It pays to serve God. 

"I believe some of you are like the fellow who was ship- 
wrecked with his wife. They lodged on a rock a quarter of a 
mile from the shore. The life savers came down and brought 
the life line. They fired it over the rock and shouted, 'Tie it 
around your body, under your arms.' He tied the rope around his 
wife's body and said to her, 'When the waves roll by, leap on 
the crest of the wave and work your arms.' When the wave 
rolled up he cried : 'Leap ! Leap !' She hesitated and clung to him 
and when the crest rolled by she leaped and the receding wave 
hurled her back. 

"They fired the life line again and he put it underneath his\ 
arms, and when the wave rolled he leaped on the crest and held 
on to the rope. When he reached the shore he found the dead 
body of his wife. She waited and the waves had hurled her 
back. I believe that right down these aisles the tidal wave is 
sweeping. If you hesitate, you are lost. Don't wait. If you 
do, the receding wave will catch you and hurl you to hell. 
'Choose ye this day whom ye will serve.' Will you ?" 



jo Life and Labors of 



Neither by the blood of goats and calves, 
but by his own blood, he entered in once into 
the holy place, having obtained eternal re- 
demption for us. For if the blood 0/ bulls and 
goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the 
unclean, sanctificth to the purifying of the flesh 
How much more shall the blood of Christ, who 
through the eternal Spirit offered Himself 
without spot to God, purge your conscience 
from dead works to serve the living God? — 
Hebrews 9:12, 13, 14. 

"This is a lesson rather than a text and I shall make the 
sermon topical rather than textual. My subject is the blood of 
the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, that doctrine around which 
all others must cluster, and more logical and illogical and theo- 
logical and idiotic battles have been fought about it than any 
other. When a man gets an inkling of a truth he immediately 
builds him a little church to propagate his doctrine in and takes 
refuge under the XIII amendment of the Constitution and makes 
war upon all others who don't see and interpret as he does. 

"A man goes to London and advertises an illustrated lecture 
on the Atlantic coast. He flashes on the screen a great long line 
of rugged bluffs and rocky promontories, with great groves 
of tamarack and spruce and birch and he dilates upon the rugged- 
ness of the scenery ; and a man in the audience takes him up as a 
fraud and a fake and says, 'I was born in America and never 
saw such scenes as you palm off on us.' And they almost came 
to blows. And the man who was challenged said, 'I have shown 
it as I saw it and you come back tomorrow night and I will show 
you some more American coast scenery.' 

"The audience reassembles the second night and the man 
shows on the screen great, far-reaching sand bars and twenty 
miles of savannas and rushes and tropical and semi-tropical trees, 
and orange groves and palmetto trees, and the man of the night 
before denounces him and says, 'I never saw such things. And 
I have lived in America and have seen the Atlantic coast.' 

"What is the matter? They were both right and both wrong, 
although that may seem a paradox. Neither one was all wrong, 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday Ji 

for the first man had seen the coast from Maine to Cape Hatteras 
and the other from Cape Hatteras to Yucatan. The coast was 
so varied that they could not crowd into one picture with so few 
views all of it. And God Almighty never undertook to give 
a picture on one screen of the whole plan of redemption. 

"From the day that Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit 
until Jesus Christ on the cross cried, 'It is finished!' God was 
giving us pictures after pictures and preparing the world for the 
greatest event that ever entered into human history. And when 
I see the great long knife in the hand of the high priest and the 
sacrifice upon the altar, and hear the lowing herds, all these are 
pictures God gave us, until at last Jesus Christ hung bleeding on 
the cross and cried, 'It is finished.' 

"The atonement is a plan whereby sinful man can be made 
one with God. At-one-ment, for a sinner has no standing with 
God and has no spiritual existence in the sight of God and exists 
just as the brute of the field. A man has no spiritual life until he 
repents and accepts Jesus Christ as his Saviour. And therefore 
I have often imagined when Adam and Eve sinned — for God told 
them that in the day that they should eat of the fruit of the 
garden they should surely die, not meaning a day of 24 hours 
— I have often imagined Adam and Eve did not regard it as literal 
death, for they had never seen a man die, the breath cease, the 
eyes close and the blood coagulate, and they may have regarded it 
as separation from God, for the Bible says that your sins sepa- 
rate between you and your God. After they sinned they went 
out into the field and plucked leaves and sought to make garments 
with which to clothe their nakedness, and from that very minute 
down to tonight, sinful man has seen himself open to the judg- 
ment of a just and a righteous God. 

"He has sought to clothe himself with philosophy, with moral- 
ity, and with science falsely so-called, but God looks through your 
philosophy, and your science, and morality, and all your postulates 
that you claim to demonstrate, of demonstrable propositions and 
all that. That you think is enough to shield you from the 
wrath of God. And you go up and down the streets parading 
your morality, and your culture, and your education. But God 




72 Life and Labors of 

looks through that and sees your black heart, and sees that you 
are in rebellion. He sees through the fig leaves that screen your 
bodies ; and he came down and saw the nakedness of Adam and 
Eve, and he went and found a beast and killed it, and threw the 
bleeding skins about Adam and Eve, and from that minute until 
tonight when a sinner has been saved from the wrath of God, I 
tell you that it has been by and through repentance, and faith in 
the blood, and if you turn your back on that you are a condemned 
sinner; or that book is a liar, from Genesis to Revelation. 

"There is no way to be saved unless you accept Jesus Christ. 
'But,' said an old infidel, 'I don't believe in the doctrine of substi- 
tution. I don't believe in the atonement. I don't believe in the 
innocent dying for the guilty.' 'Why don't you?' 'Well, because 
it does abortion to my eyes, to my ideas, and opinions.' I said, 
'To perdition with your ideas and opinions. You are a fool. 
You have an idea, and an opinion, and set it up in opposition to 
the revealed will of God, and hold to your little jackass opinions. 
The word of God says one thing, and you think another, and, of 
course, God is wrong, and you are right.' 

"A man goes to the penitentiary because of his opinions. The 
law says one thing and he does another. A man goes to hell 
because of his opinions. God's word says one thing and man 
don't believe it, and follows his own opinions and goes to hell. 
Certainly. What difference does it make about your opinions? 
Now let me say this : I have read about every thing that any 
man would read who values his time. Every thing that has ever 
been written from an infidel standpoint against the doctrine of 
the atonement, and I have yet to find the first argument of com- 
mon sense and reason. 

"And I have said : 'Old Skeptic, what have you to offer and to 
propose, that will do what the gospel of Jesus Christ has done 
for the world? Until you can trot out something that will 
make me a decent man, the drunkard sober, and transform this 
old sin-cursed world, you can take your old opinions and go 
plump to perdition. And I will nail my hopes to the cross of 
Christ, where my mother nailed hers. Then you have not seen 
life as I have seen it. For it is the rule that the innocent suffer 
with and for the guilty, or even more. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 73 

"Look at your mother. She watches, and waits, for the com- 
ing of your footsteps — you whom she brought into the world. 
She built high hopes regarding him, and at last he comes stag- 
gering and reeling into her presence. And see her cheeks become 
pale. He staggers to his bed and is soon snoring in his drunken 
sleep while she bathes her pillow with tears of anguish, and 
sobs with a broken heart. Who suffers the most, that drunken 
loafer or that innocent mother ? You only have to be unfortunate 
enough to be the mother to know. 

"Look at that young wife. She waits alone for the coming 
of him whose name she bears, and whose image is woven in the 
fibers of her heart, and when at last he comes with the foul 
stench of infamy and sin, having crawled out of the arms of 
infamy, and come to his home, see her cheeks become pale ! and 
her eyes bloodshot ; and her lips ashen ! Who suffers the most ? 
That infamous, good-for-nothing, black-hearted degenerate, and 
triple-extract of damnation and rot or that pure wife ? You only 
have to be unfortunate enough to be the wife of that dirty repro- 
bate to know who suffers the most — the innocent or the guilty. 

"This incident occurred in Chicago. In the police court a man 
was arrested for vagrancy. A letter which he had received from 
his wife was admitted by the court as evidence, and it read, 
'Dear Husband: I hope that you will not have far to go and 
long to find work> so that we can all be together again. What 
little money you left me has been spent for food and house rent. 
The children are ill and Lucy cannot go to school, and I have to 
go out washing, but people don't care to have a woman around 
with a crying child, and it is only occasionally that I can get 
anything to do.' And the letter went on as only a broken 
hearted wife can write. And the policemen with hearts like 
■ Adam's heard it, and tears ran down their cheeks. And the judge 
wiped his eyes and said, 'I have no alternative in this matter.' 
But it shows that no man lives unto himself alone. And he 
sentenced him to three months to the Bridewell. Who suffers 
most? That drunken sot, paying the price of his vagrancy, or 
that broken hearted wife in a distant city? With nothing but 
her frail body and weak arm between that little brood and the 



74 Life and Labors of 

poor house. You have only to be unfortunate enough to be the 
wife of a man like that to know who suffers the most, the in- 
nocent or the guilty. 

"I tell you that it is the plan of all plans that you and I see 
demonstrated every day, and from the fall of man, and I see no 
surcease from sorrow until the coming of Jesus Christ. It has 
been, and is, that the innocent shall suffer in, and for, the guilty. 
So don't you charge the plan of redemption as being foolishness 
on the part of God, unless you are a fool and an imbecile, and an 
idiot, and an ass — all four, and gross flattery at that. For it is 
the plan of plans, 'The Blood.' The blood stands for several 
things. First, 'The poured out life.' Some' of our so-called 
theology and hymnology are misleading. I never like the clarify- 
ing process of the blood. I think that the blood of Jesus would 
have stained your garments as blood from the wound of any re- 
pentant sinner. And it is charged upon us, that our Bible is 
bloody, and that our religion is bloody; as an old infidel said, 'I 
have no use for your damned slaughter house religion.' I tell 
you, that if you are ever kept out of hell it will be because of 
your faith in that which you sneeringly call 'slaughter house 
religion.' And when it is charged upon us that our gospel is a 
bloody gospel, and that Book bloody, I tell you men and women, 
I never have, and by the Eternal God I never will, apologize for 
it. It is a bloody gospel, and a bloody world, and you take the 
blood of the atoning sacrifice out of religion of Jesus Christ and 
you have nothing left. It is simply a laborious dissertation, and 
a jumble, and a jargon of words. The blood of Jesus taken out 
of that would not be worth any more than you or I with the 
blood drawn out. Simply a lump of clay. Everything centers 
about it. It is the only hope for us. 

"There is no other way. Everything that the blood touches 
it redeems. God offers redemption by faith in Jesus Christ. 
'Now we are redeemed, not by corruptible things such as silver 
and gold, but by blood.' Jesus Christ paid the price for every 
man's sin. The atonement of Christ covers all the sins of the 
people, but all the people won't be saved. The vilest sinner in 
Decatur, Illinois, Jesus Christ has redeemed, but he won't be 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 75 

saved unless he accepts of the redemption. If you should come to 
me hungry and I should set before you a meal, it will do you no 
good unless you eat it. No more will the plan of redemption do 
you any good unless you accept it. It is up to you whether you 
will take it or turn it down. 'We are redeemed with the blood 
of Christ/ 

"One day in Chicago I saw a company of newsboys and one 
of them had a fledgling sparrow in his hand, and I said, 'Kid, 
let it go/ 'Oh, go on with you, you guy/ I said, 'I will give 
you a cent for the bird/ He said, 'Nit/ Then I said, T will 
give you a nickel/ And he said, 'Boss, I'm from Missouri ; you'se 
got to show me first. Where is de dough ?' So I dug up a nickel 
and said, 'Give me the bird.' 'Sure, Mike/ and he gave me the 
bird. And it sat on my hand and shot one little wing out, and 
then the other, then it squatted low, and then it rose circling 
around and reached the window ledge of a grocery store, and 
about twenty sparrows came from a cornice and circled around 
my head and seemed to be saying in bird language, 'Thank you.' 
And one of the boys said to me, 'Say, you chump, what did you 
do that for?' I said, 'The Devil had you, the same as you had 
the poor little bird, and we could not get away from him any 
more than the bird could get away from you, and Jesus went on 
the cross and saved us. And he has the right to do with us as he 
wants to do. And when I paid for the bird I could do with it as 
I pleased/ 

"I bought the bird to teach them a little lesson of redemption. 
If you had something that belonged to me and you refused to give 
it up, and I could prove my ownership, I could go into court and 
make you give it to me. And I can prove to you that Jesus Christ 
paid the price to keep your soul out of hell. You are the most 
ungrateful wretch on God's dirt. It is as if he purchased it. 
He redeemed you by his precious blood. You sit there and giggle 
and turn your nose up at it. I wonder that God has any patience 
with such people. You little fool, I wonder that he don't shake 
you into hell. There are some things that you can not deny. 
Something that you can not even form an argument against. Sin- 
ful men can argue against the Bible, and if you are not grounded 



j6 Life and Labors of 






in the faith, doubt will seem more reasonable than belief. But there 
are some things that you can not argue against. Now listen. I am 
going to show you something that may astonish you. If I had not 
been four years under the care and instruction and guidance of 
two of the best men I have ever met before my eyes fell upon, 
and my hands closed over, Bob Ingersoll's lectures, and I have 
read everything that he spouted from one end of the land to the 
other before he went to hell, and if Bob Ingersoll is not in hell, 
that Book is a lie, and God had better come off His throne. He 
was going to leave behind him a wonderful record of how an 
infidel could die, and God knocked him so quick that he didn't 
have time to speak to his wife. If I had not been four years 
under the care, and the instruction, and the guidance, and tutor- 
ship, of two of the best men that I ever met, before my eyes 
rested upon and my hands closed upon Bob Ingersoll's lectures, 
I would have been preaching infidelity tonight. 

"But thanks be unto God, before I ever took into my hands his 
lectures, for four years I had gone through the Bible, and under- 
stood the plan of redemption from the time that Adam and Eve 
ate the forbidden fruit, until John on the Island of Patmos saw 
the New Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven. And 
I would take his lectures and say: 'Hold on there, Bob; you 
lie, or it is a mark of ignorance/ And I found his lectures a 
tissue of lies and falsehoods. Now listen ! How could he be an 
honest man with such an intellect as he had? And I would give 
the world for Bob Ingersoll's intellect with my willingness to 
preach the gospel. How could he with his gigantic intellect 
be such an ignoramus, when it came to the plain A, B, C of the 
gospel, repentance, and faith in Jesus Christ be saved from hell? 
But you can't argue against Jesus, and the Bible and heaven and 
hell. But you can't argue against sin. Sin is in the world. Jesus 
came to set us free from the power of sin. 

"I stood one day in Chicago, on the street, talking with a man, 
when up from the west dashed the patrol, and they dragged out 
the bodies of three women, two partially nude, their clothing 
hanging in rags, hair disheveled, eyes bloodshot, and torrents of 
profanity rolling from their lips. I said, 'There is some of it 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 77 

right now. Sin! Sin!' And we stood arguing. Up dashed 
another patrol, and they dragged out the bodies of four men, 
human derelicts, and I said, 'There is more of it. Sin !' You 
can't argue against sin. It is in the world, and the only power 
that is going to help you to overcome it, is faith in Jesus. 

"I preached one night in the Pacific Garden Mission in Chicago, 
and I was so tired, I said to my wife, 'Let us walk home. It 
won't take but about a half hour. And it will rest me.' And we 
went west on Van Buren to Clark, and north on Clark to Jack- 
son boulevard. And we started west on Jackson, and just as we 
reached Jackson, the clock struck 10, and I said, 'Wife, it is 10 
o'clock. Don't you want to go down to the Harrison street police 
station? They are just rounding up now, and bringing in the 
derelicts. Don't you want to go down to the Harrison street 
police station?' 

"The Devil, like the beasts of prey, stalks forth when the sun 
goes down, and the human vermin wriggle forth, and midnight 
on earth is midnoon in hell. Together assemble all the demons 
in hell, holding high carnival in the cities now. Drunkenness, 
murder, highway robbery, lust, and now the banquet of Old 
Bacchus, the click of the gambler's chips, wine, and champagne 
sparkles and beer foams over the lip of the cup. Now is the 
time for unlawful licentiousness, and mad revelry. Now old 
Jezebel spreads her net, and Delilah shears the locks of young 
Samson, that puts his head in her lap. Now the music is in full 
blast. Now the world reels with the mad, damnable, stinking, 
rotten licentious dance, that drags more girls to hell than all 
the things that damnation can pick out of the pit. 

"Now abound theaters, stale beer shops, opium dens, cormo- 
rants of darkness, incarnate fiends, who lure the simple off to 
ruin. Hey ! policeman ! flash your lantern in that place, and look 
at the fiendish leer of heel, the rival of the pit of woe, and when 
the clock strikes 12 the Devil throws open his kennels, and 
lets out the bloodhounds of lust and passion, and when the sun 
rises the moral wreckage strews the highways, and makes you 
stagger back. 

" Tt is 10 o'clock, Nell ; don't you want to go to the Harrison 




78 Life and Labors of 

street police station?' And we went. And I said to the desk, 
sergeant, 'I would like to go down to the cells below and look 
through.' He called a detective and said, 'You stay here and 
I will take Bill and his wife down.' And we went down. And 
there, piled up on the stone floor, with only newspapers for a 
pillow, were men. There sat a Chinaman burning a stick of 
joss, muttering the teachings of Old Confucius. We stopped in 
front of a cell and there was a man nude to the waist; hair 
matted, eyes bloodshot, and the corners filled with matter, swol- 
len tongue lolling in his mouth and his body the variegated hues 
of the rainbow, and I said, 'Is he bughouse, Ted?' 'No, he is a 
morphine fiend.' I said, 'Will morphine do that? It is worse 
than booze.' There is some hope for the booze fighter ; but for 
the morphine, or cocaine fiend, he is almost sure to take the 
count. 'Will you give him morphine ?' 'We have to or he would 
die.' And when they handed him the hypodermic syringe, he shot 
the mysterious fluid into his left arm and cooed, and smiled like 
a baby tugging at its mother's breast. And I said, 'There is 
sin.' You can't argue against sin. Old Mother Eddy, you can 
lie all you please, but you can't argue against sin. You can 
argue against Jesus, Old Infidel, and against hell, Old Un- 
believer; you cannot argue against sin. It is in the world and 
the only hope to set you free is faith in Jesus Christ. We went 
on, and stopped in front of a cell, and there were fourteen girls 
in that cell with the dew of youth on the brow, so drunk that they 
could not stand to their feet; and volumes of the vilest pro- 
fanity and licentiousness, such as I never heard, rolling from 
human lips, rolled from theirs. And one seized the remnants of a 
waist and ripped it to shreds, and stood there in her nudity, 
mocking like a demon. And I said, 'There it is — Sin.' 'Once 
she was pure as the morning dew, as she knelt at her mother's 
knee.' Sin — you cannot argue against sin. And Jesus comes to 
set us free from its power. 

"When I was secretary of the Y. M. C. A. in Chicago, I was 
walking down to work one morning, going east on Jackson boule- 
vard, and when I neared the bridge I saw a company of men and 
women and some policemen near the eastern end of the bridge. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) 4 Sunday 79 

I hurried over to the bridge and looked over the railing and I 
saw a body of a man floating in the river. The policemen were 
there with a boat and grappling hook, and brought the body to 
the bank. I went around to look at the man and I saw that his 
pockets were turned wrong side out. I saw his watch chain 
dangling from his vest and his watch was gone. I looked and 
saw that his diamond had been torn from his shirt. I looked 
and saw a great scalp wound and the skin dangling down over 
his face where they had struck him with a slingshot. I looked 
and I saw two purple holes in his temples where the bullets had 
gone in. 

"I did not say inequality between the rich and the poor, I 
did not say municipal ownership, I did not say high tariff, free 
trade or stand patterism, I did not say capital and labor. No, sir. 
I looked and I saw one word — s-i-n. Sin fired the pistol, sin 
swung the club, sin raffled the pockets, sin dumped the body a 
floater in the river. I defy you, you can't argue against sin. 
If you are ever set free from sin's power and eternal damnation, 
it will be through the blood of Jesus Christ, whom I preach to 
you tonight. 

" 'How do you do ; what is your name ? Well, I am glad to 
see you/ James O'Toole just arrived from Ireland with a letter 
of introduction to the secretary of the Y. M. C. A. in Chicago. 
I said, 'James, what can I do for you?' 'I would like to know 
where I can get a good boarding house.' 'Very well.' I gave 
him a list, and I said, 'Let me know which one you choose so 
that if any mail or a telegram comes I may know where to locate 
you/ He notified me which one he chose. He chose one on 
La Salle avenue, on the north side. I was sending out letters 
inviting the homeless young men to our annual banquet and Jim 
got my letter and had gone to bathe in Lake Michigan. In 
diving off the pier he struck the bottom of the lake and broke his 
neck. They dragged his body out and notified the police. And 
in looking through his pockets they found my letter. The chief 
of police notified me to go to the Cook county morgue and claim 
the body or he would be buried in potter's field or be given to 
the Rush medical college. I hurried down to the Western Union 



80 Life and Labors of 

and sent a cablegram to his mother. Then I went over to the 
Cook county morgue and told them the circumstances and they 
promised to keep the body three months. I was just turning 
away, sad at heart, when up dashed the patrol. They carried out 
the body of a woman that might have proved a model for an 
artist's studio; the symmetry of her form was beautiful, her 
hair was like a raven's wing, her teeth were like pearl behind 
ledges of coral, her fingers were long and tapering and her nails 
were manicured. Her fingers were so covered with jewels and 
her garments were of the latest pattern and style and of costly 
fabric. 

"I looked and saw more evidence of illicit affection, and I 
didn't say lust, I didn't say, misplaced confidence through subtlety 
and deceit. Sin robbed her of her virtue; sin put her on the 
slab of the morgue. And as I looked at that raven hair it seemed 
to me that every strand became a voice and as I stood there and 
wiped a tear from my eye it seemed to me that every broken 
blighted life, that every homewrecked sin, that every house of 
ill fame, that every penitentiary and jail and every grog shop 
and gambling hell, every home of squalor and want and cesspool 
of iniquity and every broken, blighted life, rich and poor, sent 
up endless protest. O God, how long, how long shall hell ride 
over virtue ? How long shall drunkenness triumph over sobriety ? 
How long, how long? I tell you I can't argue against sin. 

"No, sir. Your hope to be free from the power of hell and 
condemnation hereafter is by faith in Jesus. That I have been 
trying to preach to you people for four weeks. You have been 
kind to me, Doctor Penhallegon, you have been kind to me, 
Doctor Lawrence and Doctor Bowyer. I never had as fine 
an announcement, but there is not money enough in your bank 
vaults to hire me to come and preach five weeks as tired as I 
was. You haven't got money enough to hire me to do it. I 
simply do it because I want to help the cause of Jesus Christ. 
You can't argue against sin. That is all that brought me here. 
There is sin in the world and hell has you in its power and I 
want to free you. That is all that brought me here. You can't 
argue against sin. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 81 

"When the Standard Oil company was refining petroleum they 
had a black, stinking, odoriferous substance left that they could 
not dispose of. They tried to bury it, but it accumulated faster 
than they could dig graves to hold it. They started to burn 
it but the smudge and smoke — they passed a law to prohibit it. 
Driven to desperation the Standard Oil company chemists went 
into their laboratory and worked for weeks and months. They 
just took food and sleep enough to keep body and soul alive. At 
last one morning one of the chemists walked out of his laboratory 
and he held a substance in his hand as white as snow, known 
today as paraffine, used for making candles and canning fruit 
and scores of other things. 

"You can take the great repulsive mass known as humanity and 
scarred with sin, and faith in Jesus Christ will make every 
drunkard sober, and raise to his feet every fallen creature, and 
transform this sin-cursed world into a paradise. Place your 
faith in Jesus Christ. You can't argue against sin. When the 
Jews got ready to leave Egypt and go to the promised land God 
said to Moses, T want the Jews to kill a lamb and dip a bunch 
of hyssop in the blood and mark the door post of every home 
with the blood and I will pass over them.' Two Jews were stand- 
ing talking, and there listened to their colloquy an Egyptian. 
One of the Jews said, 'Did you know that tonight God is going 
to pass over this land?' 'Well, what is this about killing a lamb 
and dipping a bunch of hyssop in the blood and marking the 
door post?' 'Yes, God is coming, and he told Moses to do it/ 
'Are you going to do it?' 'Yes, as soon as the sun goes down, 
and at the evening sacrifice I will kill a lamb and dip the hyssop 
in the blood and put it over the door. Are you going to do it?' 
'No, I wouldn't go and splash up my door post for I believe 
what is to be will be no matter whether it comes to pass or not. 
If I would put the blood on my door post I would only have 
to clean it off the door tomorrow. I ain't going to do it.' The 
Egyptian says, 'It is a great God we have.' This Egyptian re- 
membered the boils and lice and remembered God turning the 
water into blood. He says, 'That is a great God and I am going 
to kill a lamb and dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood and put it 
on the doorpost.' 



82 Life and Labors of 

"At midnight the doors of heaven opened and the destroying 
angel with drawn sword started to walk through the land. When 
he came to the home of the Jew with blood on the door post he 
passed over. When he came to the home of the Jew without the 
blood on the door he went in and killed the first born. He saw 
the home of the Egyptian with the blood on the door and he 
passed over. God says, 'Wherever I see blood I will pass over/ 
and if you are under the blood of Jesus Christ I want to con- 
gratulate you : you are saved. If you are not I tell you the sword 
of God is hanging over you and when it falls it will crush you 
sure. If you turn your back to Jesus Christ you can't escape. 
Are you going to do it? 

"I read a story a while ago about a ship coming across the 
Atlantic. There was an awful storm raging, and the ship 
sprung aleak. The water ran in and the ship began to settle; 
the captain made his soundings and took his bearings and he 
summoned the crew and he said to them, 'At the present ratio 
of the increase of the water over the power of the pumps to expel 
it, in twenty-four hours we will be on the bottom of the sea. 
I have found the leak. It is in the second hold in the outer bot- 
tom. It is about the size of a man's arm. Have I got one in this 
crew who will go and sacrifice his life and save the ship and the 
crew?' They said, 'Captain, we will pump harder/ and back 
they went to the pumps, and they pumped and pumped and 
pumped. And at last he summoned the crew and said to them 
the second time, T have taken my soundings and at the present 
ratio of the increase of the water over the power of the pumps to 
expel it in ten hours we will be at the bottom of the seas. Have 
I got one man willing to go and sacrifice his life to save the crew 
and the ship ? Have I not one ?' Forth stepped a stalwart young 
fellow and he saluted the captain and said, 'Yes, father, you 
have one.' 'What, my boy!' 'Yes/ he said, as he stood there 
immovable, T will go.' 

"He bade the crew good-bye and kissed his father and sent 
messages of love to his mother. He looked at the sun and the 
sky upon which he would never gaze again and then stepped 
to the hatches and plunged into the hold of the ship. He found 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 83 

the leak and he thrust in some rags and sacks that he had brought 
with him and shoved in his arms and doubled his muscles and 
gritted his teeth. They pumped and pumped and pumped and at 
last they found the body washing with the roll of the ship. He 
found the leak and shoved in his arm and doubled it up and 
died. Through his death they brought the ship into the harbor. 

"Nineteen hundred years ago this old world sprung a leak and 
all hell rushed in and flooded it. It had begun to sink but God 
summoned His heavenly crew ; He brought the angels, Michael, 
Gabriel and all and he said, Ts there not one that will go and stop 
the break? And none came. 'What, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, 
David, Solomon, won't you go? Daniel, Joshua, Isaiah?' none 
came ; and then God summoned them again and forth stepped 
one and he said, 'Yes, father, I will go !' and swift as the morning 
light He came. He struck this old world with a thump and 
did not come up for three days. He found the breach and shoved 
in his body on that Easter morning. Out, up from the tomb He 
arose, a mighty triumph over the world. He swept through the 
gates and they cried, 'Crown him !' 'No,' He cried, 'no, I haven't 
time to be crowned ; let me get between God and the sinner, and 
with one hand shoved the sword of justice back into the scabbard 
and with the other He stretched forth and offered to give salva- 
tion to this sin-cursed world. 

"Come on sinner, listen to me. The time will come when the 
hand of salvation will be withdrawn, and He will draw his 
sword and lay aside His mediatorial robes and come and sit on 
the throne of judgment, and God pity you if you turn Him down. 
How will you get out of it. You never can, if you refuse my 
Jesus. What will you do with him ?" 



84 Life and Labors of 



Is it well with thee; is it well with thy hus- 
band; is it well with the child f — II Kings 4:26. 

"I have never delivered this sermon, or lecture, but I have felt 
myself possessed with a feeling of embarrassment which I pre- 
sume will always cling to me as long as conditions exist which 
make necessary the message, and possibly I may speak very 
plain; and if there is any one present that does not care to hear 
a plain sermon she had better get up and go out, or keep her 
mouth shut after I am through. I speak first as a minister of 
the gospel, ordained of God, and set apart of man to preach ; 
second, as the husband of a wife whom I love with all my heart ; 
and third, as the father of children for whom I would gladly give 
my life tonight. 

"Elisha had been passing by this home on his way to the 
seminary at Mt. Carmel and one day the woman of the house- 
hold said to her husband, 'I perceive that a man of God is passing 
by us continually,' and she suggested that she build for him a 
little room and place therein a stand and a pitcher, so ever 
afterward the man of God made that his home. I have some- 
times thought that she was a new woman of the old times, for 
nothing is said about her husband. 

"Some men are only known because they are fortunate enough 
to have married a decent woman. And it is the husband that 
many times makes the family name synonymous with drunken- 
ness and things that degrade and rot and pollute the world. I 
have sometimes thought that she was a new woman of the 
olden times for there is no word about her husband. She seems 
to have been constantly alert to bring help that would be the 
best for her children. She was constantly on the watch to do 
something to surround child and husband with influences that 
would help them to God. And they constrained the prophet and 
he appreciated their hospitality, but he had no money. He asked 
her if he should recommend her to the king that she might be- 
come his handmaiden. And she said 'no/ as all great women 
would say. It is only those miserable, frivolous, frizzle-headed 
devotees of society with heads full of bulk oysters that push 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 85 

themselves into places where they are not wanted. All great 
women are contented to fill their sphere. If there is anything 
that I despise it is a womanish man and a mannish woman and 
a long haired man and a short haired woman. 

"Gehazi, who was a sort of private secretary to Elisha, said to 
him, 'the woman is barren.' Elisha asked her if that was true 
and she said it was. That was a reproach that every Jewish mar- 
ried woman longed to have removed, for she was regarded as an 
object of divine wrath. If a Jewish woman was barren she was 
regarded as we regard a prostitute, only not quite so much so. 
Hannah prayed to God, and although Hannah was old, she be- 
came the mother of one of the greatest men that the world has 
ever known. 

"You know that there are homes where the advent of two 
or three children is regarded as a curse rather than as an 
evidence of God's blessing. I am aware that there are those 
here to whom God has denied that privilege and I have no 
words of condemnation for you. But for the woman that shirks 
maternity simply because she likes society and ease and fine 
clothes, her hands stained with blood, for such women I have 
extreme abhorrence and disgust. Bodies are broken, hands 
stained with the blood of unborn children, simply because she 
wished to be relieved from the cares of the nursery. Women of 
Decatur, that crime made France the charnel house of this old 
world. In one year there were fished out of the mouths of the 
sewers of Paris 10,000 new born infants. Woe betide the woman 
when she will redden her hands with the blood of unborn chil- 
dren in order to be relieved of the cares of motherhood. That 
same crime is making America the charnel house of the world 
and somebody must speak plain. 

"I was preaching for years before I felt myself led to take up 
this subject. And I was besought and pleaded with by ministers 
and Christian people and in a town in Iowa a woman said to me, 
There is a man here that we would like to get for Christ.' He 
was a doctor, and I went to him and he said, T thank you for 
coming and you are the first man that ever came to town that 
ever told the miserable hypocrites what they ought to hear and 



86 Life and Labors of 

every decent man is on your side, but you are not the first one 
that has asked me to become a Christian. I have had four women 
ask me and every one professing Christians and I felt like spit- 
ting in their faces for every one of them has come to me and 
asked me to prostitute my manhood and asked me to relieve 
them from the cares and the burdens of childhood and when 
these miserable old hags had the audacity to ask me to be a 
Christian, when they knew that I knew their hands were red 
with blood, I felt like spitting in their faces ; and if God would 
let miserable women like that through I would run my chances,' 
and I venture that many a woman sits there with her heart going 
like a trip hammer, and if she died tonight she would go to hell. 
Don't you think that I propose to shield anything. 

''I was preaching in another town and a physician said to me, 
'Look here, why don't you talk to women ?' I said I get cold feet 
when I look at them. He said to me, 'Somebody has to do some- 
thing and do more than say, "come to Jesus." You have got 
to drive the scalpel in and show why people don't come to Jesus.' 
And I said to him, 'I have been thinking along the line you sug- 
gest,' and he said, 'Well, look here, there are six women all in your 
choir every night and they have been in town, every one of them 
professing Christians, and asked me if I would not relieve them 
from the cares of motherhood.' And I said, 'Is this universal?' 
'There is not a town in this country that is not rotten with it.' 
A doctor that will do that ought to be strung up by the end of 
a rope. I have more respect for a highway robber than for 
a person like that — ten thousand times more. There is not an 
angel in heaven that would not be glad to come down to this 
earth, if God would honor them with propagating the species. 
What a great thing it is in your declining years to know that you 
made such a contribution, and that you trained your children 
so that when you died the world is poorer that you have gone. 

"Many a mother thinks that the burden of children is too 
heavy to bear. A woman brought a child to a physician and 
said that it had tried three times to take its life — it was only 6 
years old — and the physician said, 'That is not a normal thing.' 
And then he said to her, 'Did you ever try to get rid of that 



Rev. Wm, A. (Billy) Sunday 87 

child ?' And, of course, she denied it. But he said, 'I have every 
reason to believe that you lie to me. It is unnatural for a child 
to be in that condition/ and finally she acknowledged that three 
times before that child was born, she had tried to get rid of it, 
and before that child was 11 years old, he killed himself. Like 
produces like. Society is about to put maternity out of fashion, 
and when I stop to consider the character of the average society 
woman I don't know that the world has missed much after all. 
No children are more to be pitied than the children from the 
homes of affluence and ease. In the humble homes they are 
taught to respect their mothers, and the rich children are turned 
over to the care of the hired girl whose only interest is so many 
dollars per week, and while she wheels the baby in the park, the 
miserable mother is hugging and kissing some brindle-nosed pug 
dog. 

"Now, let me tell you something. I will read you from a 
clipping. I am going to take you to Chicago, to the part of the 
city where live the rich, and can show you a stretch of homes 
two miles long where there is hardly a baby, and those people 
are able to care for and to raise and to educate them. And I 
can take you back about three-fourths of a mile to where the 
middle class lives and there are three to five babies in every home. 
Down in New York city, not long ago, there was an investigation 
made in the homes of the rich and it was found that in one flat 
of ninety families, there were only two babies; and in another, 
eighty families, and only one baby; and in another seventy 
families and one baby; and in another seventy families and six 
babies. They just spend their time touring in their automobiles 
and out at the golf links and drinking wine and playing cards 
and cruising in yachts with their miserable hands red with blood. 
Right down in another section of the city where the working 
class lives they found one place where there were forty-eight 
families and 150 babies. I tell you that is going some. And in 
twenty-seven families, there were ninety-eight babies; and in 
forty-nine families there were 102 babies. I think that there are a 
lot of girls today that marry for other causes than love. I think, 
my friends, other things lead more girls to the marriage altar 
than love. Ambition and indolence ! 



88 Life and Labors of 






"Many a woman wants to read novels and chew gum and eat 
penoche and fudge, and just loll around like some lazy woman 
from the Orient; so ambition and indolence lead more to the 
altar than love. They simply endure wifehood as the price that 
they pay for the privilege of living a life of indolence, and 
eating highly seasoned food, and their bodies are nothing but a 
rack upon which to hang fashionable clothes and they never do 
anything for the world and the world would be better off if 
they were dead. 

"The most useless things on God's dirt is the mere society 
woman. Some girls marry for the novelty of it. Some marry 
because they want a home. Some marry because they want 
money. They marry somebody who has a good income although 
he may be a moral leper. Others because they want social stand- 
ing and others marry to reform a man. Say, he would not 
marry you to reform you, and you are the biggest fool on 
earth to marry some fellow to reform him. That is the reason 
that we have so many little whiffle will widows up and down 
the country. Listen. President Roosevelt wrote a letter of 
commendation to Mrs. Van Vorst, the woman who wrote the 
book entitled 'Women Who Toil,' and if you want to read some- 
thing that will interest you in the working girls who have to 
take their virtue in their hands, read that book, read something 
that will enable you to go out and benefit the world, and don't • 
loll around in indolence. 

"Roosevelt said, 'The man or the woman who deliberately 
avoids a marriage and has a heart so cold as to know no passion ' 
and a brain so shallow and so selfish as to dislike having children 
is in effect a criminal and should be an object of abhorrence to 
all healthy people.' The Michigan State Board of Health ap- 
pointed a committee to find to what extent abortion was com- 
mitted. The committee reported that to so great an extent is 
abortion now practiced by American Protestant women that 
there are seventeen abortions for every ioo pregnancies. To this 
may be added as many more who never come to the physician's 
knowledge and it causes the death of 100,000 a month in the 
United States and over 1,000,000 a year. Now, you notice that 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 89 

I said American Protestant women. Why? Because it is mostly 
committed by Protestant women. Because the Priest teaches that 
the destruction of the embryo is a crime that is equal to murder, 
and opens the way for licentiousness. For when you take away 
from womanhood the fear of maternity, it opens the gates of 
iniquity. And when you remove that fear, you remove one of 
the strongest bulwarks of virtue. Some men think that woman- 
hood is a sort of divine prerogative to breed children and patch 
their old breeches and fry a chunk of beef steak. Doctors say 
that 75 to 90 per cent of the cases of abortion are practiced by 
the married women. 

"Now as to the question, 'Is it well with thee? are you pure 
or are you guilty?' Elisha said to this woman, 'You are to be 
a mother,' and at the appointed time the child was born and I have 
often seen those wrinkled old arms go around her first born and 
she watched him grow up until he became a boy, and went out 
into the field to work and I hear him cry, 'My head, my head,' 
and the father said, 'Take him to his mother.' Fathers love their 
children. I do love to romp and play with mine, but when they 
say, 'Oh, pa, I've got the stomach ache,' I say, 'Run to ma, 
quick.' I tell you, ladies, I believe that the child begotten in 
holy love and conceived in prayer and brought forth with the 
desire to glorify God and taught of God from their earliest 
recollections, I believe that that child will no more be lost 
than the Son of God will be lost. Say, is it well with thee? 
Is it well with your husband? Yes, he is the best man in the 
world. Well, you had better send him around to hear me and 
I will try to help him to treat you with more kindness. Is it 
well with the child? There is the sting — it means much to be 
married. I don't wonder that there are so many that vote mar- 
riage a failure, but with God in the heart of father and mother 
and children, home becomes a type of heaven and the vestibule 
of glory. 

"It is much to choose and difficult for a young fellow to walk 
up and. say to a girl, 'Will you be my wife?' And it means a. 
great deal more to some girls to have some young fellow, ask 
her that question, but the fool girl that loafs around waiting to 



90 Life and Labors of 

be chosen and who shows that she is dead crazy to get married, I 
don't think that the future has very much in store that would 
be bright for her; and there are some that think, 'Well, if God 
made them one — the law of man can make them two again.' And 
so the divorce laws are damnable and pernicious. 

"There are many thinks that we are proud of in America and 
some things that are a disgrace. We lead the world in divorce. 
Every seventh home in the United States has been wrecked by 
divorce. Europe has 380,000,000 people and in the past twenty 
years, 14,000 divorces. The United States has eighty million 
people and in the past twenty years we have granted over 
1,000,000 divorces. We lead the world in that cussedness. And 
the divorce laws were made for the benefit of a lot of shyster 
lawyers and hotelkeepers about the country. In South Dakota 
a man can get a divorce on about thirty accounts. All you 
have to do is to advertise in some little newspaper that you are 
going to secure a divorce, for six months and they have com- 
plied with the law. And Sioux Falls is one of the rottenest 
towns on the American continent. It is just full of men and 
women that have come to live there for six months to get a 
divorce and half of the time they live in adultery. Many a girl 
thinks, 'Well, I will launch the matrimonial boat and try it 
once for luck,' and as a result I find lots of women praying to 
have their husbands converted. I was preaching in a town in 
Iowa and while I was preaching there, there were fifteen en- 
gagements broken and one girl invited me up to- the house for 
supper and when I reached there she rushed at me and I thought 
that she was going to kiss me, and she grabbed my hand and I 
thought she was going to keep it. And I said, 'When you get 
through with my hand I wish that you would give it back. I 
might need it.' She said, T just feel so happy, because when you 
said a girl was a fool if she married a young fellow that was 
not a Christian, I just said to him, "I won't marry a man if he 
is not a Christian and if you are not man enough to take a 
stand for Christ." He said, "If you don't marry me I will commit 
suicide." ' I told her if he was that kind she would be better off 
without him and after I left there, I got a letter from her and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 91 

she said that she guessed that he wasn't hurt very much because 
he married another girl last night. 

"Listen, girls, you marry a fellow that is not a Christian and 
one of two things will happen. First, if God sends children you 
will find that those children will follow after that father in 
99 cases out of 100. Or else you will renounce your religion and 
follow them all into hell. I tell you that you are a fool, if you 
marry a fellow that has not grit enough to stand for Jesus. There 
are many things that are worse in this life than to live and die 
an old maid. And, girls, don't look silly and giggly when talk- 
ing about love. There is nothing that is silly about it. There 
are some people that are silly when they are in love, but the 
fault is not with love but your head, and love is the noblest and 
the purest gift of God to the world, and if you don't know this, 
you are not fit to love any man, and don't forget that some of 
the noblest women that the world has ever known were old 
maids. Frances Willard was an old maid, and Florence Night- 
ingale and Clara Barton. And, girls, don't let your actions ad- 
vertise, 'A man wanted, quick.' That is the surest way not to 
get one, and I tell you that many a girl is an old maid simply 
because she wanted to do all the courting herself. And don't 
get in a hurry to hurry the thing up ; don't crowd and get him 
to ask you too quick, because if you begin to act as though you 
were after him the first thing that you know he will side-step, and 
if he wants you, he will get there quick enough. And I tell you, 
girls, don't ever be fool enough to transfer the love that God gave 
you for a child to a poodle dog. 

"And I tell you another thing, don't teach children that the 
one thing in the universe is to get married. You ought to pay 
more attention to the morals of your girls ; some woman will 
sing, 'Oh, Where Is My Wandering Boy, Tonight/ and where 
is your girl ? Gadding with some young buck around the streets. 
It is a rare thing that a man goes to hell alone — he drags some- 
body else with him, and usually a girl. Beware of those whisky- 
soaked young fellows whose dad has money, and don't overlook 
the value of Christian character. Nothing can equal it. As a rule 
fathers don't talk to their children. I preached to men on Sun- 



9 2 Life and Labors of 






day and asked how many ever talked plain to their boys. And 
there were only about eight in the audience, and I preached to 
women, and said, 'How many of you ever talk plain to your girls ?' 
And there were only about fifteen. Say, Women, it is a good deal 
better to build a fence around a precipice than to build a hospital 
at the bottom. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of 
cure. One sentence to your girl is worth more than to have her 
lie on a slab in the morgue or nursing an illegitimate child. We 
turn children loose at school and let them hear stories. I tell 
you this much : I will be mighty glad when the time comes that 
sexual hygiene becomes a part of the public school curriculum. Of 
course, the girls instructed by themselves and the boys by them- 
selves. Somebody says, 'Is there not danger in talking too plain?' 
Oh, no ; the danger is that you won't talk at all. 

"Woman, as a rule, rises -higher than the man. Morally and 
sexually they have kept themselves cleaner. I tell you, I believe 
a good woman is the best thing this side of heaven, and a bad 
woman the worst thing this side of hell, and women seem to touch 
the limit both ways, they rise higher and sink lower, and she is 
the most degraded or the most beautiful and pure in the uni- 
verse. She blesses or curses everything that she touches. Our 
homes are on a level with the women and the town on a level 
with the homes. Decatur will never rise higher than its best wom- 
en, or fall lower than its lowest women. Whatever you are, 
Decatur will be. 

"I think this — that Christ and women can save this world and 
the Devil and woman can damn it. And I don't know of any- 
thing that will hurl the world hellward faster than a bad woman, 
and I do believe that the hardest man to reach with the gospel 
of Jesus Christ is the libertine. One of the great deficiencies in 
the makeup of the average girl is the utter absence of Christianity. 
The modern young woman has almost completely separated her- 
self from religion. Listen to me ; as a rule, girls no longer look 
forward to maternity as the crowning glory of womanhood. 
Not at all ! And their homes are turned into gambling shops and 
their company consists largely in a lot of grass widowers and 
whisky-soaked young degenerates. That constitutes the com- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 93 

pany of the average girl nowadays. Nothing in the universe will 
ever make me believe that a card-playing, wine-drinking woman 
is not an abomination to God and to her sex, and to the world in 
which she lives. 

"I wish that I could make that girl who flirts see herself as 
others see her. If you make eyes at a man, of course he will re- 
pay the compliment with interest but that does not mean that 
he thinks that you are pretty or that he will introduce you to his 
- mother or sister. It simply means that that girl does not respect 
herself. Why should I respect her ? And a man will always take 
you at your estimation of yourself. If you are self-respecting 
and ladylike and chaste, they will treat you with the very same 
esteem that you place upon yourself. If you are forward and bold 
and a fool flirt, they will treat you and meet you half way every 
time. Girls come to me and say, 'Mr. Sunday, we can't walk 
down the street without some man speaking to us.' It is your 
own fool fault. I believe that ninety-nine times out of a hundred, 
it is your fault. 

"Of course, I know that there are always a lot of dirty skunks 
standing around the street corners and when the crossing is 
muddy and you have to lift your dress, they will make remarks. 
I am trying to put you on your guard. And I tell you a man can 
tell by your actions whether he dares approach you or not. Yes, 
lots of men just live upon their ability to read the nature of 
women and inveigle girls into some of those damnable hell holes 
in Decatur that I am going after before I get through. You think 
that I don't know anything about them, but you wait until I peel 
the bark off. God has placed woman on a pedestal, but when you 
come down from that pedestal, you lose all claim to be treated 
with respect. I wish that I could make the miserable little fools 
hear what the man says that you flirt with. He is just after you 
for what he can get and will pass you up as quick as a hobo will a 
wood pile. And, girls, I am thinking of your future. The idea of 
me as a father sitting down and idly watching the work of some 
seducer. I tell you that the young buck that comes shying 
around Helen I will know something about him. 

"Womanhood is the wall of civilization and you break that 



94 Life and Labors of 

down and with the stones thereof you can pave the way to hell. 
And, women, you tell your children the truth when they ask you 
questions. Some children were talking about the arrival of a 
baby in the neighborhood and were wondering where it came 
from and one little girl said, 'Well, my mamma says that they 
found it under the cabbage leaves,' and another girl said, 'An 
old woman comes around/ and another girl, a little older, came 
mighty near the truth, but she had it so perverted that it could 
not be comprehended and I say, start out with a simple book on 
botany and teach the lesson from the way the flowers grow. 
Tell the truth whatever you do. I tell you, women, if you will 
only help, I believe that in this last week we can have the great- 
est time that my eyes ever looked upon — if you will just lead out 
for God and truth and help win for righteousness, 



TEMPTATIONS OF JESUS 

"I want to explain a difficult passage of scripture so that it may 
be helpful to you, as it has been to me. The story of the 
temptation of Jesus is found only in Matthew and Luke. John 
doesn't mention it. Mark dismisses it with half a dozen words. 
Let me say that I feel myself compelled to differ from many 
learned commentators in interpreting the temptation of Jesus. 
Matthew and Luke each give a full account of the story of His 
birth, childhood, youth and genealogy, while Mark and John 
merely assume the former, dismissing it in a few words. 'Then 
was Jesus led by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of 
the Devil.' The verb tempted means to be tried or tested. The 
Spirit of God don't tempt any man to sin. The Spirit of God 
don't lead anybody to do wrong. If you are a Christian, you 
are led by the Spirit every day. If you are led by the Spirit every 
day you live, you will be tested. You will be a man or woman 
for Jesus Christ, or be a nonentity. Now many of us have 
been taught that if we had the Holy Spirit there would be no 
effort, and we would always have victory, but it will only come 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 95 

after a fight. We shall always have a fight, for victory comes only 
after a fight. 

"Whenever you find a preacher who doesn't believe in the 
Devil, he will crawl up in his pulpit, and go to sleep like a dog. 
But when the revival comes along and the Church of God gets 
busy, you will always find the Devil gets busy too. Whenever 
you find somebody that don't believe in the Devil you can bank 
on that. They have the Devil in them bigger than a woodchuck. 
When the Holy Spirit descended at Pentecost, the Devil didn't 
do a thing but go around and say that these fellows were drunk, 
and Peter got up and made him mad by saying, that it was 'too 
early in the day. It is but the third hour.' They had sense in 
those days ; it was unreasonable to find them drunk at the third 
hour of the day. But now the fools sit up all night to booze. 

"When you rush forward in God's work, the Devil begins to 
rush against you. There was a rustic farmer walking through 
Lincoln Park and he saw the sign, 'Beware of pickpockets.' 'What 
do they want to put a fool sign up like that? Everybody looks 
honest to me.' He reached for his watch to see what time it 
was and found it was gone. The pickpocket always gets in the 
pocket of those who think there are no pickpockets around. When 
ever you believe there is a Devil around, you can keep him out, 
but if you say there isn't, he'll get you sure. Old Mother Eddy 
is the most contrary, the biggest humbug, tommyrot, most idiotic 
thing of the 20th century. I can't gulp that stuff down. I am 
loading up and getting ready for that some day. 

"The Bible says there is a Devil, you say there is no Devil. 
Who knows the most, God or you? Jesus met a real low, a 
personal Devil. Reject it or deny it as you may. If there is no 
Devil, why do you cuss instead of pray ? Why do you lie instead 
of telling the truth? Why don't you kiss your wife instead of 
cursing her? You have just got the Devil in you, that is all. 
Notice : the Devil called Jesus the Son of God, and to be called the 
Son of God was to make Him equal with God. So the Uni- 
tarians in the days of Jesus sought to kill Him for His blas- 
phemy, because He said He was the Son of God. There are 
Unitarians in the twentieth century who reject Him on the same 



96 Life and Labors of 

grounds. That Jesus Christ was the Son of God we may find, for 
scripture says, 'Out of Egypt have I called my son.' 

" 'If you are the Son of God, command and these stones will 
turn to loaves of bread, and you can kill two birds with one stone, 
so get busy/ says the Devil. 'I am from Missouri, so show me. 
If you are the Son of God, all you have to do is to speak. God 
said, "let the dry land appear," and it did. You speak, and these 
stones will turn into bread.' 

"The Devil is no fool; he is onto his job. The Devil has been 
practicing for 6,000 years and he has never had appendicitis, rheu- 
matism, tonsilitis, etc. If you get to play tag with the Devil he 
will beat you every clip. If you are God, act like a God, show by 
your acts. 

"A fellow says, T am a Christian,' and he goes out and plays 
cards, drinks champagne and beer, and goes to the theater. I 
don't care what you say, you are a liar. You don't act like a 
Christian. Here is a man who says he tells the truth, but put him 
on the witness stand and he would lie like a race horse. Jesus 
was the Son of Man. He was man at the climax. Jesus crept 
into the world through the arms of motherhood, and was cared 
for as any other baby, protected from the sword of Herod, the 
same as you would protect your baby, and they took Jesus into 
the temple the eighth day and He was circumcised according to 
the Mosaic law. He grew tired, and needed sleep the same as you. 

" Tt is written that man shall not live by bread alone.' The 
Bible was not written for God. He did not need it. But for a 
guide for man. Bread feeds the body, but man needs food for the 
soul, as well. That is the reason we have so many church mem- 
bers dried up, and about ready to blow away. They are reading 
every old novel that comes along, but don't read the Bible. You 
can't eat cards and drink beer. If you treated your body as you 
do your soul, you wouldn't amount to anything. You can't live 
without the word of God, you would starve to death. 

"I am glad Jesus gave us that side of His nature — the human 
side. That manhood of Jesus filled with the Spirit of God, like 
the manhood of Paul filled with the Spirit of God, won out with 
the fight, with world, the flesh and the Devil. The manhood and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 97 

womanhood of today filled with the Spirit will win out too. I 
am glad Jesus Christ forestalled the heresy of the twentieth 
century and the heresy of the first century when as God-man as 
such, He conquered the Devil. The Devil tried by the power of 
depression and then by the power of exaltation. 

"When you were poor you served God and when you got rich 
you side-stepped. The hardest person on God's earth to make 
believe in the Devil is the man who has about $100,000 in a 
bank vault. He thinks he is immune from bending his knees and 
has a through ticket to heaven, but I tell you he has a through 
ticket to hell. Solomon prayed 'give me not riches lest I be 
puffed up/ So a man is deceived with visions of plenty. 

"The Devil says, 'worship me.' He puts a bull ring in his nose 
and leads him around at his pleasure. Jesus answered the 
Devil's temptation with scripture. 'Man shall not live by bread 
alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of 
God/ 

"The Devil has more sense that lots of little preachers. I 
have been unfortunate enough to know D. D.'s and LL. D.'s sit- 
ting around whittling down the doctrine of the personality of 
the Devil to as fine a point as they know how. You are a fool ; 
he is no four flusher. He said to Christ: Tf you are a God, 
act like it ; if you are a man, and . believe the Scriptures, act 
like one who believes.' 

"Jesus said : Tt is written/ He didn't get up and quote Byron, 
Shakespeare, etc. You get up and quote that stuff, and the Devil 
will give you the ha ! ha ! until you're grayhaired. Give him the 
word of God, and he will take the count mighty quick. Tt is writ- 
ten, thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.' 

"There is no occasion to run into temptation, but 'where duty 
calls or danger I will not be wanting there.' I am not going down 
to a grogshop to see if God will keep me from drinking while I 
am in there ; but if He sends me after someone, you can bank on 
it that I will go and He will take care of me while I am there. 
Jesus said : Tf you want to know my creed watch my conduct.' 
If you want to know what I believe watch my acts. If you want 
to know what I preach watch my practice. 



9'S Life and Labors of 

"In the first two forms of the temptation, he bases his test on 
Jesus being the Son of God, on the last the human side of Jesus, 
as the Son of Man. He says: 'I have tried to get you to act 
like a God, now we will change around. I'll be God, as I 
wanted you to be God, I have acted like a worshiper, now I will 
give you all the kingdoms of this world, for all things are mine, and 
I will give you the whole bunch if you will worship me.' Some 
people said the Devil lied. Not much he didn't. If he ever told the 
truth, he told it then. It is a matter of fact that all of the then 
known world was owned by the Devil. 

"What constituted the kingdoms of the world in that day? 
Not a believer on the throne. All the kingdoms were absolute 
monarchies. The kings owned the people, and the Devil owned 
the kings, so the Devil owned the whole crowd. So when he 
said 'Fall down and worship me/ I will fix them all up and turn 
them over to you, and you won't have to die on the cross/ it was 
true, and he could have done it, too. Somebody says he couldn't 
see all the kingdoms of the world. 'All' in this sentence, means 
'some,' 'most,' 'many/ as we use the term 'all.' He appealed 
under the principle of imitation. The Bible speaks of Israel being 
led astray by other nations in their wanting a king, of Adam and 
Eve listening to the same temptation, 'by eating of the tree of 
good and evil they should be as gods.' 

"If you are in Rome, you do as Rome does; you shoot off 
Roman candles. If you live in Decatur and want to go with the 
smart set, you have to do what the smart set does. You have 
got to play cards, dance, or imitate them, or they will pass you 
up. He tried Jesus on the same proposition, but he struck his 
Waterloo there. On the same principle of imitation, boys learn 
to smoke; if God had wanted you to smoke He would have put 
a chimney in the top of your head. We do the same with dress. 
You see I have my pants creased; it is the style. I am simply 
imitating. 

"I wear my watch chain because it is the style; part my hair in 
the middle (but that is a necessity). Some of you ladies used to 
wear the leg of mutton sleeve with enough goods in them to make 
a skirt out of; they are out of style. In language and dress we 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 99 

learn by imitating. The Chinese eat with chop sticks, and some 
people study books of etiquette on how to carry food to the mouth 
and drink your coffee out of the cup, or sip it out of the saucer ; 
yet, I like to do it that way, don't you? (Mr. Sunday imitated 
drinking out of a saucer.) I remember when I was a little boy 
my mother wore hoops that made her look like a center pole 
in a circus tent. 

"Many a sinner goes to hell because he imitates others going 
that way. We ought to imitate Jesus Christ, not go tagging 
around the Devil. The Lord knows the kind of life He wants 
you to live and has set an example for you to imitate with your 
whole being. There are two conditions which the Christian 
should assume : the power of resistance, and the power of counter 
attraction." 

The speaker illustrated the former by the classic story of 
Ulysses being moved by the Sirens, whose music he was unable 
to resist, and he illustrated the latter by the story of Orpheus, 
v/ho used the counter attraction of superior music and won the 
Sirens. "When I have Jesus Christ on board I have something 
better than all hell can belch out, and when you have the song 
of salvation in your heart you will pass up rag time, like a hobo 
does a wood pile. All heaven is pledged to help you win. 'He 
was tempted in all points like we are, yet without sin ; where- 
fore he is able to succor them that are tempted.' " 

L.0FC. 



ioo Life and Labors of 



The word was made flesh and dwelt among 
us. — John 1 :14. 

"Jesus Christ is a world of thought. There are vast continents 
and oceans that never will be traversed by any mind or minds. 
I believe that in Jesus there are vast subjects which no mind has 
ever fathomed or ever will, such as His deity, His humanity, His 
incarnation, His personality, and His plan for the redemption of 
the world, and influence, and although the greatest minds the 
world ever produced have all tried to master these, they have 
been convinced after noble and laborious effort that there are 
vast regions of thought which stretch out way beyond their 
horizon, or comprehension. All say their experience is analogous 
to that of Isaac Newton, who in attempting to describe his search 
after knowledge said he felt like a little boy walking by the sea- 
shore, here and there occasionally picking up some pebbles, while 
the vast deep rolled unexplored at his feet. And since that is the 
experience of great men, and wise men, it would be the height 
of absurdity in me at this time, to attempt to discuss these sub- 
jects. I wish tonight to call your attention to just one phase 
of the subject, namely, the Incarnation of Jesus. 

"Webster defines it, 'As the taking of the human body ; the act 
of clothing with flesh.' I wish to speak of it as a mystery, as a 
revelation, and as a prophecy. To be convinced that it is a mys- 
tery you need only to study the teachings of the Bible about the 
incarnation of Jesus. The Bible always presents a subject in the 
simplest of language, and never attempts an explanation. The 
fullest, simplest accounts are found in John, and Paul's Epistles. 
The Jews took up stones to stone him, and Jesus said, 'Many good 
works have I showed you from the Father; for which of those 
works do you stone Me?' 

"The Jews answered Him: 'For a good work we stone Thee 
not, but because you blaspheme God.' But what familiar words 
these are. But who understands them ? But they must be under- 
stood before you can understand the basis of the incarnation. 
'In the beginning was the Word and the Word became flesh and 
dwelt among us.' So that means that God became man and be- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 101 

came Incarnate in the flesh. Who knows all about God? I 
know something about God, and you know something about 
God, but no man or woman ever lived that knew all about God. 
So God, or a thing, or an object, or a being is a mystery when 
there is about God or that object, or being, or thing, that which 
you cannot understand. 

"That watch is a mystery. I can understand that it is eight 
minutes past eight, but I do not understand about the wheels 
and all, so that becomes a mystery to me when there are things 
about it that I can't understand. So anything is a mystery when 
there is about it that which you cannot understand. For all 
scholars will agree what that means, but on the scene comes the 
fool who says I won't believe what I can't understand, but you 
do every day that you live. You believe what you cannot under- 
stand. Take reason. What is that? Reason is that faculty of 
mind by which we trace the relation of causes and effects and 
phenomena, and that which leads up to and causes the phenomena 
and effect. What is it by which you trace the cause of the 
effect ? It is reason. What is reason ? It is the faculty by which 
you trace the relation of cause and effect. So you see that you are 
a wheel within a wheel. Where did reason come from and what 
does it consist of? Do you believe that you have reason? Yes. 
Reason has done many things. Reason has penetrated far into 
science. Reason can tell you tonight 50 years from now the 
minute when the eclipse will take place or when a certain comet 
will swing within the vision of the human eye. 

"But man with all his power knew not God. As for any way 
whereby a sinner might be reconciled with God consistent with 
Divine perfection it never entered mind or heart of man until re- 
vealed by the spirit of the living God. Man by reason knew not 
God. Now then, let us get back to that old adage about this 
world. How it got here and what it is for. 

"Now it is here and let us accept the generally accepted 
philosophy that atoms are the foundation of the universe. All 
right. Let us start with the principle which teaches that every 
cause must have its effect and every effect its cause. There is an 
electric light — it is an effect — what is the cause — why reason runs 



102 Life and Labors of 

right down that wire to the power house. That is, because of the 
dynamo. Here is a railroad train. Reason causes it — that is 
effect. But reason cannot do all things. But it can do a good 
many things. Here is a croquet ball ; you hit that ball and it hits 
another, but if your mental apparatus is in good mental working 
order you must ultimately come back to some force that made the 
first ball strike the second. What started the movement of the 
ball — how do you account for that? You say it so happened; 
then you are easily satisfied. 

"Is it not a wonderful thing that a set of atoms working inde- 
pendently would make an eye, and another set of atoms should 
make this old world of sky and sea and air ? And is it not a third 
wonderful thing that a set of atoms working independently should 
make an eye, and a world, and when you bring that eye and that 
world together you find the eye peculiarly adapted to each other ? 
How do you explain that ? 'Oh, there is a will that resides in each 
atom that made the eye up/ How did the 'wills' know what 
kind of a world to make to fit the eye? Then you say, 'a will 
residing in each atom made the world.' Then how did the 'wills' 
know in each atom that made the world, what kind of a world 
to make to fit the eye ? Then the 'wills' residing in all the atoms 
must have had a conclave, and the 'wills' in the atoms that made 
the eye said, T am going to make this kind of an eye,' and the 
others said, 'We will make this kind of a world.' 

"Now, here ; I will put a fellow in the cellar here in Decatur 
and say, 'Make a lock.' And I will put another fellow in a cellar 
some place else, and say to him, 'Make a key.' And when you 
bring them together, why the key fits the wards in the lock. How 
do you explain ? One mind was presiding over it, and the mind 
said to one man : 'You make a key,' and the same mind to the 
other man, 'You make a lock,' and of course when they were 
brought together they had to fit. 

"That is just exactly how I fit and how you fit in this old world. 
Is it not wonderful that a set of atoms will make a chicken in the 
shell with an organism that it cannot use in the shell, but when it 
comes out it finds conditions in the world peculiarly adapted to 
the development of that organism? That is because God made 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 103 

the chicken, and God made the world, and knew what the chicken 
needed and wanted. So when you crawled into this world you 
found the world exactly suited to your organism. And God Al- 
mighty knew that you were a sinner, and religion is peculiarly 
adapted to you, just as water satisfies thirst. God knew you and 
your needs and sin and provided salvation through Jesus Christ. 
And it fits your case. So this is not luck. 

"Take consciousness, 'The power of my mind by which I know 
my own existence,' as the operation of the laws of nature. But 
there are a whole lot of things about myself that I don't know, 
and a whole lot of things that you don't know about yourself, and 
a whole lot of things about both of us that the doctor knows. 
There are lots of things about you that I know, that you don't 
know ; and a whole lot of things about both of us that no one 
but God knows. Reason says, 'give it food and drink.' Reason 
says, 'give it food.' I do that, therefore my life is preserved 
because I care for my body according to my knowledge — cer- 
tainly. But there are a whole lot of things about myself that I 
don't know. But do I refuse to care for myself because there 
are a lot of things that I don't know ? 

"Can you trace the circulation of the blood? No, you will get 
balled up in two minutes. Do you understand how food assimi- 
lates to the body, and makes hair, and corpuscles, and veins, and 
bones, and muscles ? No ? Well, will you refuse to eat because you 
have not sense enough to understand? Then there are lots of 
things that people don't understand. Then don't you butt into 
God's because there are lots of things that you can't understand. 
You poor fool, there are lots of things that you can't understand 
that you believe. Here are mysteries on every hand. I am com- 
pelled to believe, or cease to exist, right now. 

"If you had lived in the times of Homer and asked what upheld 
the universe you would have been told it rested on the shoulders 
of a giant, named Atlas. And we borrowed the old heathenistic 
idea and put a picture on the front of the geography of a great 
big guy with the world on his back. Whoever saw old Atlas and 
upon what did he stand while he upheld the universe? They just 
simply believed the mystery. 



104 Life and Labors of 



''But the Hindoo gave the Greeks the horse laugh. They said 
this world rests on the back of an elephant, who in turn stands 
on the back of a turtle, who has no visible means of support. 
When they moved that caused the rising and the setting of the sun, 
and the ebb and flow of the tide, and the spring, and summer, 
and autumn, and the winter. In two little stories of Greek, and of 
Hindoo, we have summed up the old world philosophy. 

"Listen, we have a philosopher in our day that is omniscient. 
If we accept his testimony they are both wrong. The world is 
held in place by two forces called the centripetal and the 
centrifugal, and one says, T want to get away from the center/ 
and the other wants to go to the center, and the operation of the 
two forces produce what we call the force of gravity, and pre- 
vents us from flying off on a tangent. What is the force that 
produces motion ? What is the motion ? The motion is the result 
of force; and that is as far as your philosopher will go and he 
will cash in. Nobody ever saw, felt, or measured force. You 
simply see, hear, or feel the effects. You don't see force. You 
saw when that arm struck this arm, and you hear when the hands 
come together, but you didn't see the force. You simply saw the 
effects of force. 

"I shoot a gun, you hear when the gun goes off. You see when 
the bullet strikes. You feel it if it hits you. But you do not see 
the force at all. You just simply feel the effects of force. So 
force is a mystery. Now I think that that is enough to show 
any reasonable man — and you all look reasonable. Don't any of 
you look bughouse. 

"Explain to me the influence of Jesus in moving men and 
women to great things, to do mighty deeds. None was ever equal 
to Jesus Christ in moulding the lives of men and women. From 
the beginning of His earthly career 2,000 years ago until tonight, 
in Decatur He has been moulding and shaping the lives of men 
and women. Our hearts are like a great big piano; each heart 
is like a key, to which He sits and upon which* He plays. He 
brings forth sounds and notes of sorrow and sin, then great hal- 
lelujah and triumphs over the world and the flesh and the devil. 
He knows the capacity of the human heart. He knows all about 



lid 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 105 

it. Explain why it is men and women come down the aisles and 
take my hand. That explains why it is. It is the name of Jesus 
Christ that moves you to do great and noble deeds. That explains 
why it is that the name of Jesus Christ appeals to you and leads 
the booze fighter to cut it out, and the thief to steal no more and 
the cussing man he makes pray and leads men to leave sin and 
iniquity. That explains to me why it is that Jesus Christ moves 
men and women to do mighty deeds. 

"But onto the scene butts the infidel. He swells out his chest, 
some little two by four, and he says, 'Look here, Mr. Sunday.' 
'What is it?' 'How do you account for the fact that so many 
of the intelligent men and women of the world disbelieve in 
Christianity ?' 

"Listen to me. It is just the opposite. There has never been 
a time in the history of this world when the divinity of Jesus 
Christ and the inspiration of that Book has been more generally 
accepted and firmly believed by the intelligent men and women 
than in your day and mine, and for you to sneer and scoff at Jesus 
Christ and the Bible is a sign that you are a fool. 

"Tell you another thing ; listen to me. A man or a woman be- 
comes too progressive to be a Christian. Whenever you become 
too intelligent to believe in the Bible as the word of God then your 
influence as a business associate and as a companion for others 
is at an end. Don't you be hoodwinked, young man, into sup- 
posing that to be a doubter is evidence of a superior intelligence. 
It is evidence of a pigmy intellect or a black heart, one of the 
two, and I have never met a man in my life that disbelieved in 
Jesus Christ as the son of God who wasn't living in sin. When 
I can get him to give up sin he doesn't have much trouble about 
believing. Explain to me why it is that missionaries leave their 
homes and leave their bones bleaching on the sand hills. People 
don't leave their homes and go to Europe and all that for Shake- 
speare. Explain to me why missionaries kiss their loved ones 
good-bye and go out and live in foreign fields. 

"Say, I am going to believe these things. I see sinners being 
saved, drunkards made sober, men and women being transformed. 
How are you going to disbelieve all you hear sweeping our lands ? 



io6 Life and Labors of 

Accept Jesus Christ as the son of God and the rest will become 
easy. ' Listen ; if the embassy of the Chinese dynasty 65 years after 
Christ had come had gone 1,500 miles further south in their 
search, China would be Christian tonight instead of Pagan. The 
teaching of Confucius was perverted, and the people saw into it. 
So the dynasty appointed an embassy to go down south and find 
that incarnated God, for reports of Jesus Christ had reached their 
land, and they were going to find Him and bring Him back to 
teach the people and raise them out of their degradation. They 
loaded their camels with gold and silks and they went down the 
eastern coast of China and came on into India and on down and 
made inquiry. They were told the incarnated God lived on an 
island. Chinese have an aversion for water but they secured 
rafts and boats and put out and in a few hours reached the island 
of Ceylon, and there they found and saw old Buddha, and his 
pernicious teachings. They poured their gold and myrrh at his 
feet, and they said we have found and seen the incarnated God. 
They took the Buddhist priests back to China and tonight there 
are 50,000,000 Buddhists in China. Had they come 1,500 miles 
further south they would have met Paul and Peter and John and 
the disciples of Jesus Christ and they would have carried back 
to China tidings of the son of God and China would stand where 
America stands in Christianity and civilization and advancement, 
instead of where she is tonight. 

"I tell you it is the followers of this Christ that make the world 
what she is tonight. The word became flesh and dwelt among 
us/ And lastly it is a prophecy, not so much of a foretelling. I 
am prophesying in His name. I am telling you that by faith the 
drunkard can be made sober. I am telling you that the liar can 
be made truthful. I am telling you that God will transform you, 
if you will accept Him as your Christ. Listen, if a man starts 
out to live the kind of life he knows he ought to live, sooner or 
later something happens to make him realize how far short he 
is of reaching his ideal. Here is a man that wants to be generous ; 
he finds himself a rasping, grasping, squeezing old skinflint. Here 
is a man who concludes he wants to be truthful, and he finds him- 
self a liar. Here is a man who wants to be a pure man, and he 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 107 

finds himself a libertime. And here is a man that wants his hands 
to reach out, his mouth to be filled with words of praise and 
messages of love, and he discovers that they are frequently filled 
with obscenity and profanity and in his failure to reach his ideal 
he gets discouraged. Here is a man who wants to be sober and 
he falls off the water wagon. He wants to pray and he cusses; 
he wants to be honest and he steals. Now in his failure to reach 
his high ideals every man starts out to live the kind of a life that 
he knows he ought to live. Some day something will happen 
that will make him realize how far short he is of attaining his 
ideals. I want to help you, everybody. I don't care who you are. 
Then he says, 'Woe is to me, I am undone/ He sits up yonder 
and I am down here. Now then, here is what I am, there is what 
I ought to be. Now how am I going to get what I am trans- 
formed into what I ought to be ? 

"Old Mother Eddy butts in and says : Tt is nothing, it is noth- 
ing.' On comes the Universalist and says : 'We will all be saved/ 
You lie. On comes the Unitarian with his faith. You are a liar. 
Any man is a liar that doesn't believe in Christianity. He is a 
liar. Many a man lies who doesn't preach Jesus Christ from the 
pulpit. I don't care whether he is a Congregationalist, Baptist or 
what he is, he is a liar. You know what the Bible says : a lot of 
you preachers are going to sizzle, too, like a burnt boot. 

"Whenever you reach the spot in your life when you will 
honestly say : 'Here is what I am, I am a booze fighter and I ought 
to be sober ; here I am, I cuss and I ought to pray ; here I am, a 
libertine and I ought to be pure ; here I am, I lie about my neigh- 
bors, and I ought to keep my mouth shut ; here I am, in debt and 
I won't pay my debts and I ought to be honest.' Whenever you 
ask that question Jesus Christ will walk out and stand in front of 
you and He says : 'If you are not what you ought to be and if you 
want to become what you ought to be, the only way to do it is to 
accept me/ The only way to dig out of what you are and get 
into what you ought to be is through Jesus Christ. 

"The Bible tells you and me that the only man who ever lived 
that was what he was and what he ought to be was Jesus Christ. 
Jesus was what He ought to be, and was, too. He was the only 



io8 Life and Labors of 



ed who made 



man that ever lived, the only man that ever breathed 
what He was and what He ought to be the same thing. And He 
says, 'I am able to take you out of what you are and put you into 
what you ought to be, if you want to.' If you are not now what 
you ought to be because you don't want to be, you old geezer, it is 
your own fault. God will do it for you if you will only let Him. 
God can make you pure if you will give him a chance. 

" The word became flesh and dwelt among us.' Jesus Christ 
came into the world and revealed God to man and revealed man 
to man. Jesus Christ revealed God to man and Jesus Christ re- 
vealed me to myself. God came to us through Jesus Christ, and if 
I want to know God I have got to know Jesus Christ. If I don't, 
I never will know Him. 

"There are dozens of men in Decatur, if you are not what you 
ought to be and want to be what you ought to be, and will listen 
to me, I will show you that Jesus Christ can take you out of what 
you are and make you into what you ought to be. Jesus came into 
the world to make pure men and women. Isn't that great ? 

"The world is a great big cradle and Christ stands by it and 
rocks it, and rocks it, and as he rocks it, he says to the world, 
T am going to make great men and women ; make impure men, 
pure men ; going to make drunkards sober ; going to make blash- 
phemers Christians ; going to make thieves not to steal ; going to 
make them all who are obscene, vile and iniquitous and transform 
them.' He rocks the cradle called Christianity, and he pours out 
Paul the greatest preacher and teacher and philanthrophist the 
world has ever known. Accept the Apostle Paul and his trans- 
formation without the incarnation of Jesus Christ and you insult 
and slander Jesus Christ. 

"He rocks the cradle and from it comes Augustine. Account 
for Augustine being transformed to a St. Augustine without ac- 
cepting Jesus Christ and you insult and slander God. He rocks 
and rocks the cradle and forth comes Martin Luther, Germany's 
great monk, who blazed out the word of God and nailed it on the 
door of the church. Account for Martin Luther and his reforma- 
tion without Jesus Christ as the Son of God and you insult Martin 
Luther and history and slander God. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 109 

"He says, 'Hear me, you were not what you ought to be.' He 
took Paul the murderer and made him an apostle. He took 
Augustine and made him a saint. He took Martin Luther and 
transformed him into a blazing light. He says, 'I am going to 
take men and women who are not what they ought to be and 
make them into what God wants/ 

'"Will you do it?' He rocks the cradle and forth comes Wesley, 
and Spurgeon, and multitudes I can't name. He rocked the cradle ; 
down the streets of New York city, one stormy night, went a 
missionary. He was thinly clad, and he shivered with the cold. 
As he passed the door of a grog shop it flew open and out came 
a great big, hog jowled, buttermilk eyes, red-nosed son of perdi- 
tion shoving a poor, straggering, muttering, spewing drunkard 
out of a stale beer joint, and says : 'To hell with you ; get out of 
here/ 

"I have been told that a saloonkeeper said that if local option 
wins it will be the damn drunkards do it. You black-hearted 
scoundrel, come up here and tell me that, and I will knock you 
down, if I have to pay a fine the next day. You have belched 
forth your double distilled liquid damnation; you have ripped 
the carpet from the floor ; you have wrecked the home of happi- 
ness and blighted the lives of wives and children, and then have 
the nerve to stand up and make a statement like that, you miser- 
able skunk. 

"Out he staggered and he lay there, bleeding and groaning. 
The missionary helped the poor old man to his feet and talked 
with him. The drunkard said to him, Tard, if you want to help 
me, give me your overcoat/ The missionary was thinly clad but 
he pulled his overcoat off and wrapped it round the shivering form 
of the old drunkard, and said : 'Come up to the mission and hear 
about Jesus/ He staggered to the front and accepted Him as his 
Saviour. He stated out himself preaching the gospel of Jesus 
Christ. 

'One night he was preaching in a mission of his own when a 
man arose and asked permission to speak. He came to the plat- 
form and said : T sat and listened to that man and he moved me 
to tears/ He told that three years ago a petition was presented to 



no Life and Labors of 

him to pardon that man and he refused to do it because he was 
in the penitentiary. That man standing there making that con- 
fession was Governor John Dix of the state of New York. He told 
that that man had served seven terms in the Sing Sing peniten- 
tiary. There he was preaching Jesus Christ and they flocked to 
hear him. 

"A few years later he died and by a disease brought on from the 
days of his life in sin. And they asked Doctor Taylor if he would 
not speak a word over the remains. Doctor Taylor says, I tried 
to beg off, but they insisted, and I finally consented. The funeral 
took place at 10 o'clock. At 9 o'clock they had to send for the 
mounted police to clear the street. They opened the doors of the 
Broadway tabernacle and it filled as if by magic. Men came from 
Wall street, bankers closed their banks, merchants came by scores 
and scores. They clamored to see him and they opened the coffin 
and allowed them to pass by and take a last look at him. Endless 
streams came, and flowers for the coffin, and they piled them up 
until it was a pyramid ten feet long and several feet high ; and 
beneath it slept Jerry McAuley. Account for him without Jesus 
Christ and you will insult him and his wife. Go to New York 
city and you will find drinking fountains to perpetuate his mem- 
ory. The pastor of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian church said 
that Jerry McAuley had more power of God over the metropolitan 
population than all the pastors combined in New York. 

"You are not what you ought to be and he says, 'Accept me 
and I will make you into what you ought to be.' He rocked and 
rocked the cradle. Down the streets of Chicago twenty-five years 
ago this winter went a burglar. Under his coat he had a burglar's 
kit wrapped up in a piece of carpet. He was going to crack a safe, 
but the throngs of people on the street made it unsafe for him 
to proceed and he said, 'It won't do to tackle that job now, it is 
too early/ 

"He staggered along and he saw a light ahead and he heard 
singing. He went in and dropped in the rear seat and God 
aroused his conviction. When the invitation was given he went 
to the front and threw his burglar's kit on the platform at the 
feet of the preacher, and dropped to his knees and cried, 'God, 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday in 

forgive me.' If you go to Chicago you go down to ioo East Van 
Buren and go in and you will see a little man, 5 feet 5 or 6, smooth 
face ; no I think he has a small, iron-gray mustache, and meet my 
friend, Harry Monroe. Account for Harry Monroe and myself 
without accepting Jesus Christ as the Son of God and you insult 
every drop of sweat that rolls from my face tonight, and all that 
come down and take my hand and say I accept Jesus Christ. 

"And he rocked and rocked his cradle. Down on a street of 
New York city stood a drunkard leaning up against a lamp post. 
He staggered up the street muttering and murmuring, and finally 
he staggered into a man and asked him where he could find 
Merit's store. The man wrote the address on a piece of paper and 
he staggered on. He grew tired and sat down on the curbstone 
and leaned against the lamp post. A policeman touched him with 
his club and ordered him to move on. He got up and said, 'Say, 
pard, you can tell me where Steve Merit's store is ? I had a piece 
of paper here but I lost it; can you tell me where the store is?' 
The policeman told him to go down to the corner and around 
and across the street and it was a big building. He staggered 
down and staggered in and staggered up to the office and begun 
to unravel his tale of woe to the great millionaire undertaker. 
John Waverly leaned back in his chair and looked at him. There 
stood a man with a straight Grecian nose, finely chiseled fore- 
head and large, intelligent brown eyes that sat far apart. He had 
long, tapering fingers and finely moulded chin of decision. He 
had clean and even teeth and John Waverly saw in that bundle 
of rags something more than a mere guttersnipe. He saw some- 
thing more than a mere down and outer. He looked at him and 
he said, 'here,' and he ran his hand down into his vest pocket 
and handed him a five dollar bill. He said, 'You go out and get 
a bath, a shave and clean shirt and collar; go get your shoes 
shined and come back here at 3 o'clock and I will give you five 
hundred/ He stood there with tears running down his cheeks 
and said, 'You never saw me before.' 'No.' 'And you trust me 
with $5.00?' 'Yes ; if I can trust you with that I can trust you with 
other things.' 

"He staggered out and as the clock struck 3 he stood there 



ii2 Life and Labors of 

erect and straight. He had got a shave and a clean collar and 
necktie and his shoes were shined and his clothes brushed and he 
looked like a new man. Three months later two men stood on 
the platform of the Talmadge tabernacle to speak to 3,000 people. 
One was Steve Waverly, the multimillionaire of New York and the 
other John G. Wooley, prohibition candidate for president of the 
United States. Account for his salvation without accepting Jesus 
Christ and you insult and slander God and the world. And I see 
Him on this earth surrounded by multitudes. I see the church 
filled. I see people press down the aisle by the thousand and they 
say, 'we are what we are by the grace of Jesus Christ.' He made 
us what we are. 

"The man says: 'I was a drunkard and he made me sober.' 
Another says, T used to swear and he made me pray.' Another 
says, T used to mistreat my wife and He made me kind to her. 
My children used to run when they heard my voice and my step, 
now they rush to meet me when I come home with my dinner 
bucket.' 

"Yes, we are what we are by the faith in Jesus Christ. And 
I see large throngs up yonder in glory. I can see the trumpeter 
Gabriel sounding the reveille on the resurrection morning. We 
are what we are by the grace of God through Jesus Christ. 

"Presently the waves and tempest will pass away and the mist 
will clear away and there towering over the rock of time we will 
catch a glimpse of the cross of Jesus Christ, friend, and you and I 
by faith in Him can wave the palm of victory and cry : 

'All hail the power of Jesus' name, 

Let Angels prostrate fall, 
Bring forth the royal diadem, 

And crown Him Lord of All.' 

"He became flesh and dwelt among us to turn us from sin. 
Don't pass it up." 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 113 



BOOZE SERMON 

As a preface to his lecture, Mr. Sunday read a few verses of 
Scripture. He then announced his text from the eighth chapter 
of Matthew, describing the casting out of the devils which entered 
into the swine. He said : 

"We have one of the strangest scenes in all the gospels. Two 
men possessed of devils confront Jesus, and while the devils 
are crying out for Jesus to leave them He commands the devils to 
come out and the devils obey the command of Jesus. The devils 
ask permission to enter into a herd of swine feeding on the hill- 
side. And this is the only record that we have of Jesus ever 
granting the petition or prayer of devils. And he did it for 
the salvation of men. 

"Then all the peanut-brained, hog-jowled, beetle-browed fellows 
that kept the hogs ran back to town to old pussy lobsters that 
owned the hogs and said: 'A long-haired fanatic from Nazareth 
has driven the devils out of some men and the devils have gone 
into the hogs and the hogs into the sea and the sea into the hogs 
and the whole bunch died/ And then the fat, pussy old fellows 
came out to see Jesus and said that he was hurting their business. 
A fellow says to me: T don't think that Jesus Christ did a nice 
thing/ You don't know what you are talking about. 

"Down in Nashville, Tenn., I saw four wagons going down the 
street and on them men in blue uniforms, and the wagons were 
loaded with stills and kettles and pipes. 'What is this?' I said. 
'That is the United States revenue officers and they have been 
in the moonshine district and confiscated the illicit stills, and they 
are taking them down to the government scrap heap.' Jesus 
Christ was God's revenue officer. Now the Jews were forbidden 
to eat pork. But Jesus Christ came and found that crowd buying 
and selling and dealing in pork and confiscated the whole busi- 
ness. And He kept within the limits of the law when He did it. 
Then the fellows ran back to those who owned the hogs to tell 
what had befallen them. And those fat pussy hog owners said 
to Jesus: 'Take your helpers and hike. You are hurting our 
s 



H4 Life and Labors of 

business/ And they looked into the sea and the hogs were 
bottom side up, but the men were right side up, and Jesus said : 
'What is the matter ?' 

"And they answered, 'Leave our hogs and go.' A fellow says 
it is a rather strange request for the devils to make, to ask per- 
mission to enter into hogs. I don't know — if I was a devil I would 
rather live in a good decent hog than lots of you men and if you 
will drive the hog out you won't have to carry slop to him — so 
I will try to help you get rid of the hog. 

"And they told Jesus to leave the country. They said : 'You are 
hurting our business/ 'Have you no interest in manhood?' 'I 
have no interest in that, just take your disciples and leave, for you 
are hurting our business/ 

"That is the attitude of the liquor traffic toward the church, 
and state, and government, and the temperance worker, and the 
preacher that has the backbone to fight the most damnable, hell- 
soaked, corrupt institution that ever wriggled out of hell, and 
fastened itself on the public. 

"I am not a third party Prohibitionist. But I am a temperance 
Republican from the top of my head down to my toes. Who is the 
man that fights the whisky business in the South ? It is the Demo- 
crat ! They have driven it from Georgia, and they have driven it 
from Mississippi, and Tennessee, and out of 119 counties in Ken- 
tucky, they have driven it from every county but four. And they 
have driven it out of 157 counties in Texas. And it is the rock- 
ribbed Democratic South that is fighting the saloon. They started 
this fight that is sweeping like fire over the state of Illinois today. 
The Democratic party of Florida has put a temperance plank in its 
platform and the Republican party of Illinois would nail that 
plank in their platform if they thought that it would carry the 
election. The Democrats hate the business with all their power, 
and it is simply a matter of decency, and manhood, irrespective of 
politics. It is simply prosperity against poverty, sobriety against 
drunkenness, honesty against thieving, heaven against hell and 
iniquity. Don't you want to see men sober? Brutish, vomiting, 
staggering men transformed into respectable citizens? 'No/ said 
a saloonkeeper, 'to hell with men. We are interested in our busi- 
ness. We have no interest in humanity/ 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 115 

"After all is said that can be said upon the liquor-traffic, it has a 
degrading influence upon the individual, the family, and politics, 
and business, and upon everything that you touch in this old 
world. For the time has long gone by when there are any 
grounds for arguments of its ill effects. There is just one prime 
reason why the saloon has not been knocked into hell and that is 
the false statement, 'that the saloons are needed to help lighten 
the taxes.' The saloon business has never paid, and it has cost 
fifty times more for the saloon than the revenue derived from it. 

"You listen today, and if I cannot peel the bark off that dam- 
nable, rotten, stinking fallacy, I will pack my trunk and leave. 
Listen ! I say that is the biggest lie ever belched out of hell. The 
wholesale and retail trade of Iowa pay every year $500,000 in 
licenses. Then if it is no draw-back it ought to reduce the tax- 
ation 25 cents a head. If the saloon is necessary to pay the taxes, 
and if they pay $500,000 in taxes, it ought to reduce them 25 
cents a head, but no; the whisky business has increased taxes 
$1,700,000 instead of reducing them, and I defy any whisky man 
on God's dirt to show one town that has the saloon, where the 
taxes are lower than where they do not have the saloon. I defy 
you to show me an instance. 

"Listen ! Say, 75 per cent of our idiots come from intemperate 
parents ; 81 per cent of the paupers ; 82 per cent of the crime is 
committed by men while under the influence of liquor ; 90 per cent 
of the adult criminals are whisky made. The Chicago Tribune 
kept track for ten years and found that 56,556 murders were com- 
mitted by men under the influence of liquor. Professor Wiley 
said : 'Why, the whiskv can strengthen, and is needed to nerve 
me.' Certainly, Professor Wiley ! It will nerve me to murder 
men on the highway ; it will nerve a man to stab his wife, and to 
do the dirty, low down things that a man would not have thought 
of doing if he had not been under the influence of that damnable, 
rotten, stinking business. Certainly ! 

"Archbishop Ireland, the famous Roman Catholic of St. Paul, 
said of social crime today, That 75 per cent is caused by drink, 
and 80 per cent of the poverty/ I go to a family and it is broken, 
and I say, 'What caused this?' I step up to a young man on the 



n6 Life and Labors of 

scaffold, and say, 'What brought you here ?' 'Drink !' Whence all 
the misery, and sorrow, and corruption ? Invariably it is drink. 

"Five Points, in New York, there is a spot that was as near 
like hell as any spot on earth. There are five streets that run to 
this point, and right in the middle was an old brewery, and the 
streets on either side were lined with grog-shops. The news- 
papers turned a searchlight on the district and before they could 
stop it, the first thing they had to do was to buy the old brewery 
and turn it into a mission, and today it is a decent respectable 
place. The saloon is the sum of all villainies. It is worse than war, 
or pestilence. It is the crime of crimes. It is the parent of crimes, 
and the mother of sins. It is the appalling source of three-fourths 
of the crime, and of course it takes three-fourths of all the taxes 
to support that crime. And to license such an incarnate fiend 
of hell, is the dirtiest, low down, damnable business on top of 
this old earth. There is nothing to be compared to it. 

"The legislature of Illinois has appropriated $6,000,000 to take 
care of the insane people in the state of Illinois, and whisky 
business produces 75 per cent of the insane. That is what you go 
down in your pocket to help support. If I remember right, the 
legislature appropriated nearly $9,000,000 to take care of the 
institutions, and do away with the saloon, and you will close these 
institutions. They are the ones that make them necessary, and 
they make the poverty, and the jails, and fill the penitentiaries. 
Who has to pay the bills? The landlord that don't get the rent 
because the money goes to the whisky gang ; the butcher and the 
grocer, and the charitable person, who takes pity on the children 
of the drunkards, and the tax-payer who supports the insane 
asylums, and other institutions, and the whisky business keeps 
full, and makes you go down in your pocket to support. 

"Do away with the cursed business and you will not have to 
put up to support them. Who makes the money ? The dirty dogs 
of saloon keepers, and the brewers, and the distillers, and that 
is the gang that fills the land with misery, and poverty, and 
wretchedness, and disease, and death, and damnation, and it is 
being authorized by the will of the sovereign people. 

"You say, 'that people will drink it anyway' — not by my vote. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 117 

You say 'that men will murder their wives anyway' — not by my 
vote. 'They will steal anyway' — not by my vote. You are the 
sovereign people. And what are you going to do about it this 
afternoon ? 

"Listen: In 1900, the factory valuation of the malt, and dis- 
tilled liquors was $334,680,156, but they cost the men that drank 
the dirty stuff five times that amount of money. These same in- 
dustries gave a profit of $447,836,000 to 8,814 proprietors,, and 
they bought $66,822,000 worth of material and paid in wages $27,- 
551,529, and employed 43,254 people directly and several hundred 
thousand middle men. There are the figures and if the American 
people will stop drinking whisky we could with the money saved, . 
pay the brewer and the distillers 10 per cent on their present 
invested capital of $500,000,000 and we could pay the farmer 10 
per cent on his present sales to the breweries and we could sup- 
port, my friends, the 43,000 people that work in the breweries— 
we could support the saloon keepers, and their families, and we. 
could save $500,000,000 a year. 

"If we would simply stop drinking we could take the money 
which we saved and pay the brewers 10 per cent, and pay the 
farmers 10 per cent, and pay the present wages to the brewers, 
and the saloon keepers and could support their families, and save 
$500,000,000 a year, to say nothing of the misery and crime if 
we put it purely on a financial basis. Now, it takes $3,005 invested 
in the whisky business to give employment to one man. Of the 
ten leading industries that have a capital of $3,000,000,000, it takes 
only $1,021 invested in their business to give employment to one 
man. In other words I could take the money invested in the 
breweries and invest it in other, business, and hire three times as 
many men as in the breweries and the distilleries today. If you 
want the facts you are up against them, and I defy any whisky 
lawyer on God's dirt, and if you are here, get up ; I want to look 
at you, and I will riddle you with holes. 

"Now, last year the corn crop was 2,553,732,000 bushels, and it 
was valued at $350,000,000. Secretary Wilson says that the brew- 
eries use less than .2 per cent; I will say that they do use 2 per 
cent. That would. make 51,000,000 bushels; and at 50 cents a 



Ii8 Life and Labors of 

bushel that would be about $25,000,000. How many people are 
there in the United States? 80,000,000. Very well, then, that is 
2J cents per capita. Then we sold out to the whisky business for 
27 cents a piece — the price of a dozen eggs, or a pound of butter. 
We are the cheapest gang this side of hell, if we will do that kind 
of business. 

"Now, listen; last year the income of the United States 
government and the cities, and towns, and counties from the 
whisky business — I am going to be liberal — was $250,000,000. 
That is putting it liberally and will provide for the government 
revenue. Well, you say that is a lot of money. Listen ; last year 
the workingmen spent $1,400,000,000 for drink. And it cost 
$1,200,000,000 to cover the judicial machinery. In other words 
the whisky business cost us last year $2,600,000,000. I will sub- 
tract from that the dirty stinking, rotten $250,000,000 which we 
got, and it leaves $2,350,000,000 in favor of knocking the whisky 
business out purely on a money basis. And listen ; say, last year 
we spent $6,000,000,000 for our paupers and criminals and the 
increase in wealth was only $5,000,000,000 ; so you can figure out 
how long it will take us to go into bankruptcy with that cussed 
business back of us. The average factory hands earns $450 a 
year, and it cost us $1,200 a year to support four whisky criminals. 
There are 326,000 whisky criminals in the United States and then 
they have the audacity to appeal to men's decency and say the 
saloon is needed for money revenue. Never was there a blacker- 
hearted lie, a heart so vile, or a brain to conceive or lips black 
enough to utter such a lie. 

" 'But,' says the whisky fellow, 'we would lose trade — the 
farmer would not come to town to trade.' You are a dirty, black- 
hearted liar. I am a farmer. I was born and raised on a farm, 
and I have the stink of the barnyard on me today. Yes, sir. And 
when you say that, you insult the best classes of men on God's 
dirt. Do you know that ? Say, when you put up the howl that if 
you don't have the saloons the farmer won't trade, say, Mr. 
Whisky Lawyer, why did you dump money into Springfield like 
water and back the legislature into a corner, and fight to the last 
ditch to prevent the enactment of county local option ? 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 119 

"You knew if the farmers were given a chance they would 
knock the whisky business into hell the first throw out of the 
box. You are afraid. You have got cold feet. You are afraid 
to give the farmer a chance. They are just scared to death of you 
farmers. 

"And say, my friends, New York city's annual drink bill is 
$365,000,000 a year, $1,000,000 a day. Say, listen a minute, 
that is a million dollars more than the income from the tariff, 
and four times the annual output of gold. And it is at least 
one-third of the value of all the coal mined in the United States. 
And in some sections of New York there is one saloon for every 
thirty families. The money spent in New York by the working 
people for drink in ten years would buy every working man in 
New York a beautiful home and allow $3,500 for house and lot. 
New York's annual drink bill would buy 73,000,000 barrels of 
flour, nearly a barrel for every man and woman in the United 
States. It would take fifty people one year to count the money 
in $1 bills, and they would cover 10,000 acres of ground. That 
is what the people in New York dumped into the whisky hole in 
one year. And then you wonder why there is poverty and crime, 
and the country is not more prosperous. 

"This dirty gang are circulating a circular about Kansas City, 
Kan. That circular is a dirty, stinking, blackhearted lie, and I 
defy you to prove a statement in it. Listen : Kansas City is a town 
of 100,000 population, and temperance went into effect July 1, 
1906. Then they had 250 saloons, 200 gambling hells, and sixty 
houses of ill fame. The population was largely foreign, and in- 
quiries have come from Germany, Sweden and Norway, asking 
the influence of the enforcement of the prohibitory law. 

"At the end of one year the president of one of the largest 
banks in Kansas City, who had protested against the enforcement 
of the prohibitory law on the ground that it would hurt business, 
at the end of one year said his bank deposits had increased $1,700,- 
000. And just wait a minute. The Home City bank had 
business that increased 46 per cent and J2 per cent came from 
men who had never had a dollar saved before. And 42 per cent 
came from men who had never had a dollar, but because the sa- 



120 Life and Labors of 

loons were driven out they had a chance to save. And the people 
who objected on the ground that it would injure business, found 
an increase of 209 per cent , in building operations, and further- 
more, there were three times as many building homes as before, 
and there were more people seeking investment. And court ex- 
penses decreased $225,000 in one year. 

"I understand that you have from 40 to 60 men in jail. All 
right. I understand that it costs about 40 cents a day to feed and 
to keep them. Who pays that? Why you go down in your socks 
and pay for what that cussed gang has dumped in there. They 
don't do it, and that gang will take pictures and say that they are 
pictures of Kansas City, Kans., and they will show empty build- 
ings. Say! why don't you take a picture of Joliet? Why don't 
you go down and take a picture of wrecked, blighted homes, and 
of the insane asylums with gibbering idiots, that it costs $6,000,000 
to support ? And the whisky gang send 72 per cent of them there. 
Why don't you take a picture of that, you cussed gang, and not 
fight under cover ? You have not the character, and you have not 
principle enough to do it. There are 105 counties in Kansas, 
and only 21 have paupers, and only 25 have poor houses, and 
there are thirty-five jails empty. It used to require eight weeks 
to try the criminal cases, and now six weeks is the longest, and 
in one term there was not a case on the docket. 

"Before the saloons were closed they were getting ready to 
build an addition to the jail. Now the doors swing idly on the 
hinges, and there is nobody to lock in the jails. And the commis- 
sioner of the poor farm says there is a wonderful falling off of 
old men and women coming to the poor house, because their sons 
and daughters are saving their money. And have quit spending 
it for drink. And they had to employ eighteen new school teachers 
for 600 boys and girls, between the ages of 12 and 18 that had 
never gone to school before, because they had to help a drunken 
father support the family. And they have just set aside $200,000 
to build a new school house, and the bonded indebtedness was 
reduced $245,000 last year, without the saloon revenue. And 
don't you know another thing? In 1906 when they had saloons, the 
population, according to the directory, was. 89,655. According 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 121 

to the last census the population was 100,835, or an increase of 
12 per cent in one year, without the grog shop. It is a miserable 
lie to say that the people are moving away. You are a dirty liar. 
They are moving in so fast that they can't take care of them. 

"I tell you, gentlemen, the American home is the dearest her- 
itage of the people, for the people, and by the people, and when 
a man can go from home in the morning with the kiss of wife 
and children on his lips, and come back at night with an empty 
dinner bucket to a happy home — that man is a better man, whether 
white or black, for he can go away with the kiss of his wife, and 
come back home at night to a happy home. No sir — whatever 
takes away the comforts of home — whatever degrades that man 
and woman, and whatever invades the sanctity of the happy 
home, is the deadliest foe to the home, and church, and state and 
school. And the saloon is the deadliest foe to the home, and the 
church and the state, on top of God Almighty's dirt. 

"And if all the combined forces of hell should assemble in con- 
clave, and with them all the men on earth that hate and despise 
God, and purity, and virtue — if all the scum of the earth could 
mingle with the denizens of hell to try to think of the deadliest 
institution to home, church and state, I tell you, sir — the combined 
hellish intelligence could not conceive of, and bring forth, an 
institution that could touch the hem of the garment of the open 
licensed saloon to damn the home and manhood, and woman- 
hood, and business, and every good thing on God Almighty's 
dirt. 

"In the Island of Jamaica the rats increased so that they de- 
stroyed the crops and they introduced the mongoose, which is 
a species of the coon. And they have three breeding seasons a 
year and there are 12 to 15 in each brood, and they are deadly 
enemies of rats. The result was that the rats disappeared and 
there was nothing more for the mongoose to feed upon, and then 
they attacked the snakes, and the frogs, and lizards, that fed upon 
the insects, with the result that the insects increased and they 
stripped the gardens,, eating up the onions, and the lettuce and 
then the mongoose attacked the sheep and the cats and the puppies 
and the calves and the geese. And I will tell you, sir, now Ja- 



122 Life and Labors of 

maica will have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get 
rid of the mongoose. The American mongoose is the open li- 
censed saloon — it eats the carpet from off the floor, and the clothes 
from off your back, the money out of the bank, and it eats up 
character, and it goes on until at last it leaves a stranded wreck 
in the home which is the skeleton of what was once brightness 
and happiness. 

"Like a drummer on a railroad train; there were some men 
playing cards, and one fellow pulled out a whisky flask and passed 
it about, and when it came to the drummer he said, 'No/ 'What,' 
they said, 'have you got on the water wagon?' and they laughed 
at him. He said : 'You can laugh if you want to ; but I was born 
with an appetite for drink and for years I have taken from five 
to ten glasses per day, but I was home in Chicago not long ago, 
and I have a friend that has a pawn-shop there. I was in there 
when in came a young fellow with cheeks sunken and a wild look 
on his face, and he came up trembling and threw down a little 
package and said, "Give me ten cents." And what do you think 
that it was ? It was a pair of baby shoes. My friend said : "No, 
I cannot take them." But he said, "Give me a dime ; I must have 
a drink." "No, take them back home ; your baby will need them." 
And the poor fellow said, "my baby is dead — and I want a 
drink." ' 

"Boys, I don't blame you for the lump that comes up in 
your throat. That dirty business that will drive a man to that, 
and then ask the franchise of decent men, I don't understand. 

"The only interest that it pays is red eyes and foul breath, and 
the loss of health. You go in with money and you come out 
empty; and you go in with caracter and you come out ruined; 
and you go in with a good position and lose it. You lose your 
position in the bank, and you lose your place in the cab of the 
locomotive. And it pays nothing back but disease and damnation, 
and gives an extra dividend in delirium tremens, and a free pass 
to hell. And then it will let your wife be buried in the potter's 
field, and your children go to the asylum, and yet you walk out and 
say that the saloon is a good institution, and it is the dirtiest on 
God's dirt. It has not one leg to stand on, and nothing to back it 
up and to commend it to a decent man — not one thing. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 123 

" 'But,' you say, 'we will regulate by high license ?' Suppose 
you pay $500 a year license, and there are sixty-three here, that 
would be $31,500 paid in licenses in a year. How many people 
live in Decatur? 35,000. That is not a dollar a head. You are 
the cheapest gang that I ever looked at. That is not a dollar a 
head, and say, do you want to pay taxes on boys, or dirty money ? 
A man that will sell out to that dirty, cussed business, I have no 
use for. That is less than a dollar apiece — not a dollar apiece. 

"You let that gang buy you for a dollar? You see how absurd 
their arguments are. You say, if you drink bourbon in a saloon 
that pays a $1,000 a year license, will it eat your stomach less, than 
if you drink it in a saloon that pays $500 license ? Is it going to 
have any effect on you whether the gang pays $500 or a $1,000 
license ? No, it will make no difference whether you drink it over 
a'mahogany counter or a pine counter. It will have the same effect 
on you, to damn you. So there is no use of talking about it. 

"In some insane asylums, do you know what they do? When 
they want to test some patient to see whether he has recovered 
his reason they have a room with a faucet in it, and a cement 
floor, and they turn on the faucet and give the patient a mop and 
tell him to mop up the floor, and if he has sense enough to turn 
off the faucet and mop up the floor, they will parole him. But 
should he let the faucet run, they know that he is crazy. Well, 
that is what you are trying to do. You are trying to mop it up with 
taxes, and insane asylums, and you have jails, and Keeley cures, 
and reformatories, and you are trying to mop the business up with 
that. The only thing to do is on the first of April to shut off the 
faucet. 

"A man was delivering a temperance address at a fair ground 
and a fellow came up to him and said: 'Are you the fellow that 
gave a talk on temperance?' 'Yes/ 'Well, I think the managers 
did a dirty piece of business to let you give a lecture on temper- 
ance. You have hurt my business, and my business is a legal one/ 
'You are right there,' said the lecturer, 'they did do a mean trick. I 
would complain to the officers.' And he took up a premium list 
and said, 'By the way, I see there is a premium of so much offered 
for the best horse, and cow, and butter. What business are you 



124 Life and Labors of 

in ?' 'Well, I don't see that they offer any premium for your busi- 
ness. You ought to go down and compel them to offer a premium 
for your business, and they ought to offer on the list, $25 for 
the best wrecked home, and $15 for the best bloated bum that you 
can show, and $10 for the finest specimen of a broken-hearted 
wife, and they ought to give $5 for the finest specimen of thieves 
and gamblers, and you can trot them out. You can bring out the 
finest looking criminals, if you have something that is good, trot it 
out. You ought to come in competition with the farmer, with his 
stock and the fancy work and the canned fruit.' 

"I tell you that the saloon is a coward. It hides itself behind 
stained glass doors, and opaque glass windows and sneaks its 
customers in at a blind door, and it keeps a sentinel to guard the 
door from the officers of the law, and it marks its wares with false 
bills of lading, and offers to ship green goods to you, and marks 
them with the name of wholesome articles of food, so that people 
won't know what is being sent to. you. And so vile did that busi- 
ness get, that the legislature of Indiana passed a law forbidding 
a saloon to ship goods without they are properly labeled. And 
the United States congress passed a law just the other day, forbid- 
ding them to send whisky through the mails as they had been 
sending it. 

"I tell you it strikes at night. It fights under cover of darkness 
and assassinates the characters that it cannot damn, and it lies 
about you. It attacks defenseless womanhood and childhood. The 
saloon is a coward. It is a dirty thief, and it is not an ordinary 
court offender that steals your money, but it robs you of manhood, 
and leaves you in rags, and takes away your friends, and it robs 
your family. It impoverishes children, and it brings insanity and 
suicide. 

"It will take the shirt off your back, and it will steal the coffin 
from a dead child, and yank the last crust of bread out of the 
hand of the starving child; it will take the last bucket of coal 
out of the cellar, and the last cent out of your pocket, and send 
you home blear-eyed and staggering to your wife and children. 
It will steal the milk from the breast of the mother, and leave her 
with nothing to feed her infant. It will take, the virtue, from 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 125 

your daughter. It is the dirtiest, lowdown, damnable business 
that ever crawled out of the pit of hell. It is a sneak, and a 
thief, and a coward. 

"It is an infidel. It has no faith in God. It would close every 
church in the land. It would hang its signs on the abandoned 
altars of the church. It would close every public school. It re- 
spects the thief and it esteems the blasphemer. It fills the prisons 
and the penitentiaries. It despises heaven, hates love, scorns 
virtue. It tempts the passions. Its music is the song of a siren. 
Its sermons are a collection of lewd, vile stories. It wraps a 
mantle about the hope of this world and that to come. Its tables 
are full of the vilest literatures. It is the moral clearing house 
for rot and damnation and poverty and insanity, and it wrecks 
homes, and blights lives today. 

"The saloon is a liar. It promises good cheer and sends sorrow. 
It promises health and causes disease. It promises prosperity and 
sends adversity. It promises happiness and sends misery. Yes, 
it sends the husband home with a lie on his lips to his wife; and 
the boy home with a lie to his mother ; and it causes the employe 
to lie to his employer. It is a dirty liar. It degrades. It is God's 
worst enemy and the Devil's best friend. Seventy-five per cent, 
of impurity comes from the grog shop. It spares neither youth 
nor old age. It is a dirty parent, and, waiting with a dirty blanket 
for the baby to crawl out of its mother's womb, until it can wrap 
it in poverty and disease. It lies in wait for the unborn. 

"It cocks the highwayman's pistol. It puts the rope in the hands 
of the mob. It is the anarchist of the world, and its dirty red 
flag is dyed with the blood of women and children, and it sent the 
bullet through the body of Lincoln, and it nerved the arm that 
sent the bullet through Garfield and William McKinley. Yes! 
It is a murderer ! Every plot that was ever hatched against our 
flag, and every anarchist plot against the government and law, 
was born and bred and crawled out of the grog shop to damn this 
country. 

"But I tell you that the curse of God Almighty is on the saloon. 
Legislatures are legislating against it — decent society is barring 
it out. The fraternal brotherhoods are kicking it out. The 



126 Life and Labors of 

Masons, and the Odd Fellows, and the Knights of Pythias, and 
the A. O. U. W. are closing their doors, and are saying to the 
whisky seller, 'Get out, and don't wriggle your dirty, stinking car- 
cass into our lodge.' 

"Yes, sir. I tell you the curse of God is on it. Legislators 
are legislating against it. The lodges, the Masons, Odd Fellows, 
Knights of Pythias, are against the saloon. Yes, it is on the down 
grade. It is headed for hell, and by the grace of God I am going 
to give her a push with a whoop for all I know how. Listen to 
me. Say, listen to me. I am going to show you how we burn our 
money up. It costs 20 cents to make a gallon of whisky sold 
over the counter at 10 cents a glass — it will bring $4. 'But,' says 
a saloon keeper. 'Bill, you must figure in the strychnine and 
cochineal.' 'Yes, it increases the heart beat 30 times more in a 
minute, and you consider the licorice, and potash and logwood 
and other damnable poisons that are put in. And I believe one 
cause for the unprecedented increase of crime is due to the poison 
put in the cussed stuff, nowadays, to make it go as far as they can. 

"I will show you how your money is burned up. It costs 20 
cents to make a gallon of whisky sold over the counter at 10 
cents a glass, which brings $4. Listen; where does it go? Who 
gets the 20 cents ? The U. S. government for collecting revenue 
and the big corporations, and part is used to pave our streets and 
pay our police. All right, where does it go ? I will show you. I am 
going to show you this afternoon how it is burned up, and you 
don't need half sense to catch on, and if you don't understand keep 
still and nobody will ever know the difference. 

"I say, 'Hey, Col. Politics, what is the matter with the 
country?' He swells up like a poisoned pup, and says to me: 
'Bill, why the silver bugbear. That is the matter with the 
country.' 

"Say the total value of the silver coined in this country in 
1904 was $63,598,800. Hear me, in 1904 the total value of the 
gold produced in this country was $80,722,000, and we dumped 
ten times that much in the whisky hole and didn't fill it. What 
is the matter? In 1904 the total value of all the gold and silver 
was $444,558,000 and we- dumped three times that amount in 
the whisky hole and didn't fill it. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 127 

"What is the matter with the country, Col. Politics? Oh, he 
swells up and says : 'Mr. Sunday, standpatism, sir.' I say you 
are an old windbag. What is the matter with the country ? 'Oh,' 
says my Republican friend, 'revision of the tariff.' Another 
man says 'free trade; open the doors at the ports and let them 
pour the products in, and we will put trust on the sidetrack.' 

"Say, you come with me to every port of entry. Listen, last 
year the total value of all the imports was $1,438,000, and we 
dumped that much in the whisky hole in twelve months. 'Oh/ 
says a man, 'let us count South America and Europe to sell 
our products. That is what is the matter, we are not exporting 
enough.' Say, last year the total value of all the exports was 
$1,900,000,000, and we dumped that amount in the whisky hole 
in one year and three months, and did not fill it. 

"One time I was down in Washington and went to the United 
States treasurer and said: 'I wish you would let me go where 
you don't let the general public/ And they took us around on 
the inside and we walked into a room about twenty feet long 
and fifteen feet wide, and as many feet high, and I said, 'What 
is this?' This is the vault that contains all the national bank 
stock in the United States. I said: 'How much is here?' They 
said: '$578,000,000/ And we dumped nearly three times the 
value of the national bank stock in the United States in the 
whisky hole last year, and we didn't fill the hell hole up at that. 
What is the matter? 

"Say, whenever the day comes that all the Catholic and Protes- 
tant churches— just whenever that day comes that you say to the 
whisky business : 'You go to hell/ that day the whisky business 
will go to Kell. But say, you sit there, you old whisky voting 
elder and deacon and vestryman, say you would not strike your 
hands together on that proposition, it would stamp you an old 
bullnecked hypocrite, and you know it. Why don't we kill it ? 

"Say, hold on a little bit. Have you got a silver dollar? I 
am going to show you how it is burned up; for listen to me 
we have in this country 250,000 saloons, and allowing fifty feet 
frontage for each saloon it makes a street from New York to 
Chicago ; and say 5,000,000 men, women, and children go daily 



128 Life and Labors of 

into the saloons for drink, and marching twenty miles a day it 
would take thirty days to pass this building. And marching five 
abreast they would reach 590 miles. There they go by, look at 
them. 

"Listen; on the 1st day of January, 500,000 of the young men 
of our nation entered the grog shop and began a public career 
hellward, and on the 31st of December I will come back to De- 
catur, and summon you people and ring the bell, and raise the 
curtain, and say to the saloons and breweries: 'On the 1st day of 
January I gave you, sir, 500,000 of the brain and muscle of 
our land, and I want them back, and have come in the names 
of homes and church and school ; give me back what I gave you. 
March them out.' 

"I count and 165,000 have lost their appetites, and become mut- 
tering, blear-eyed, vomiting drunkards wallowing in their own ex- 
crement, and I say: 'What is that I hear, a funeral dirge? What 
is that procession/ A funeral procession 3,000 miles long, and 
110,000 men died drunkards in this land of the free and home 
of the brave: Listen, in an hour twelve men died drunkards, 
300 a day, and 110,000 men a year. One man will leap in front 
of a train, another will jump into the river, another will plunge 
from the dock into the lake. Another will throw his hands to 
his head, and life will go out. Another will cry, 'Mother,' and 
his life will go out like a -burnt match. 

"I stand in front of the jails and count the whisky criminals. 
They say: 'Yes, Bill, I fired the bullet.' 'Yes, I backed my wife 
into a corner and beat her life out. I am waiting for the scaf- 
fold.' T am waiting,' says another, 'to slip into hell.' On, on it 
goes. Say, let me summon the wifehood and the motherhood 
and the childhood, and see rain down upon their upturned faces 
the tears. People of Decatur, tears are too weak for that hellish 
business. Tears are only saltish backwater that well up at the 
bidding of an occult power, and I will tell you I am going to per- 
petuate this feud against the liquor traffic until I die, and I hope 
to live long enough to see the white winged dove of temperance 
build a nest on the dome of the capitol yonder, and peace will 
reign over the state I love with all my heart, my friends. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 129 

"I hold a silver dollar in my hand. Come on, we are going 
to a saloon. We will go down to the Busy Izzy. Whatever they 
do, I think they get busy making drunkards out of men. Come 
on, we will go there and spend that dollar for a quart. It takes 
twenty cents to make a gallon of whisky and a dollar buys a 
quart. You say to the saloon keeper, 'give me a quart.' 

"I will show you if you will wait a minute how she is burned 
up. Come on. I have a silver dollar. It costs 20 cents to make 
a gallon of whisky. Come with me. Here, I am John, an old 
drunken bum with a wife and six kids. (Thank God that is all a 
lie.) Come on, I will go down to a saloon and throw down 
my dollar. It costs 20 cents to make a gallon, a nickel will make 
a quart. My dollar will buy a quart of booze, who gets the nickel ? 
The farmer for corn or apples. Who gets the 5 cents? The 
United States government, the big tillers, the big corporations. 
Come on, I am John, a drunken bum, and I will spend my dollar ; 
I have worked all week and got my pay. Come on, I go into 
a grogshop and throw down a dollar. The saloon keeper gets 
my dollar, I get a quart of booze. Come home with me. 

"I stagger, and real, and spew and puke into my wife's presence, 
and she says: 'Hello, John, what did you bring home?' 'A 
quart.' 'What will a quart do? It will burn up my happiness 
and home and fill my home with squalor and want. So there is 
the dollar. The saloon keeper has it. Here is my quart, I have 
that. There you get the whisky end of it, here you get the work- 
man's end of it. 

"But come on, I will go to a store and spend the dollar for a 
pair of shoes. I want them for my son, and he puts them on his 
feet, and with the shoes to protect his feet he goes out and earns 
another dollar, and my dollar becomes a silver thread in the woof 
and warp of happiness and joy, and the man that owns the build- 
ing gets some, and the clerk that sold the shoes gets some, and the 
merchant, and the traveling man, and the wholesale house get 
some, and the factory. And the man that made the shoes, and the 
man that tanned the hide, and the butcher that bought the calf, 
and the farmer that raised the calf, and the little colored fellow 
that shined the shoes, and my dollar spreads itself, and nobody is 
made worse for spending money. 
9 



130 Life and Labors of 

"I join the Booster Club for business and prosperity. A man 
said : 'I will tell you what is the matter with the country : "over- 
production." ' You lie. It is underconsumption. 

"Say, wife, the bread that ought to be in your stomach to satis- 
fy the cravings of hunger is down yonder in the grocery store, 
and your husband has not money enough to carry it home. Meat 
that ought to satisfy your hunger hangs in the butcher shop. He 
has not the money to buy it. The cloth for a dress is lying on a 
shelf in the store, but your husband has not the money to buy it. 
The whisky gang has his money. 

"What is the matter with our country? Come on, I am John 
the drunkard. I would like to do like this. Boys, every booze 
fighter here, get on the water wagon. Join me, come on. I would 
like to summon all the drunkards in America and say, 'Boys, let's 
cut her out, and spend the money for flour, meat and calico, what 
do you say?' Say, $400,000,000 will buy all the flour in the 
United States ; $400,000,000 will buy all the beef cattle. And 
$400,000,000 will buy all the cotton at $50 a bale. But we dumped 
more money than that in the whisky hole last year, and didn't 
-fill it. Come on, I am going to line up the drunkards. Everybody 
fall in. Come on, ready, forward, march, right, left, here I come 
with all the drunkards. We will line up in front of a butcher 
shop. Butcher says: 'What do you want, a piece of neck?' 'No, 
how much do I owe you? Here's your dough. Now give me a 
porter house steak and a sirloin roast.' 'Hey, what do you want?' 
'Beefsteak.' 'What do you want?' 'Beefsteak/ 'What do you 
want?' 'Beefsteak.' 

"We empty the shop, and he runs to the telephone. 'Hey, 
central, give me the slaughter house. Have you got any beef- 
steak, any pork, any mutton ? Yes, send her up quick.' They strip 
the slaughter house, and then telephone Swift, and Armour, and 
Nelson Morris and Cudahy to send down trainloads of beefsteaks 
to Decatur. 'What's the matter? The damn bunch has got on the 
water wagon/ And Swift and the big packers in Chicago say 
to their salesmen : 'Buy beef, pork and mutton/ 

"The farmer sees the price of cattle and sheep jump up to three 
times their value. Let me take the money you dumped into the 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 131 

whisky hole and buy beefsteaks with it. I will show you what is 
the matter with America. It is the dirtiest, rottenest business this 
side of hell. 

"Come on, are you ready? Fall in. We line up in front of a 
grocery store. 'What do you want ?' 'Why, I want flour.' 'What 
do you want?' 'Flour/ 'What do you want?' 'Flour.' 'What 
do you want?' 'Flour.' 'Pillsbury, Minneapolis, Sleepy Eye.' 
'Yes.' 'Ship in trainloads of flour. Send on the fast mail, an 
engine in front, one behind and a Mogul in the middle. 'What 
is the matter?' 'Why, the workingmen have stopped spending 
their money for booze and begun to buy flour.' The big mills 
tell their men to buy wheat and the farmers see that the price has 
jumped up to over $2 per bushel. What is the matter? The 
whisky gang have got your money, and you have an empty stom- 
ach, and yet you will walk up and vote for the dirty business. 

"Come on, cut out the booze, boys. Get on the water wagon ; 
get on for your wife and babies, and hit the booze a blow. 
Come on; ready, forward, march, right, left, halt. We are up 
in front of a dry goods store. 'What do you want?' 'Calico.' 
'What do you want?' 'Calico.' 'What do you want?' 
'Calico.' Calico, calico, all right, come on. The stores are 
stripped. 'Hey, Marshall Field, Carson, Pirie, Scott & 
Co., send down calico. The whole bunch have voted out the 
saloons, and we have a demand for calico ; what will we do ?' And 
the big stores telegraph to Fall River to ship calico, and the fac- 
tories telegraph to buy cotton and they tell their salesmen to buy 
cotton and the cotton plantation man sees cotton jump up to $150 
a bale. What is the matter ? Your children are going naked, and 
the whisky gang has got your money. That is what is the matter 
with you. Don't listen to those old whisky soaked politicians who 
say 'standpatism, sir.' Come on a minute. Now mind you, we 
have the whole bunch of booze fighters on the water wagon, and 
I am going home now. Over here I was John the drunkard. 
The whisky gang got my dollar and I got a quart. Over here I 
am John on the water wagon. The merchant got my dollar, and 
I have his meat, flour, and I have calico now, and am going 
home. 'Be it ever so humble, there is no place like home.' Come 
on, come on. I am up in front of the house. 



132 Life and Labors of 

"Wife comes out, and says, 'Hello, John, what you got?' 
'Two porterhouse steaks, Sally.' 'What's that bundle, pa?' 
'That's a pair of shoes for you, Tom. And here is some cloth to 
make you a pair of pants. Your mother has patched the old ones 
so often they look like a map of the United States.' 'And what 
have you there ?' 'Cloth to make you a new dress ; your ma has 
■ fixed your old one so often it looks like a crazy quilt." 
' "What's the matter with the country ? We have been dumping 
the money that ought to be spent for flour, beef and calico ; we 
have been dumping it into the whisky hole and it isn't filled up 
yet. A man comes along and says : 'Are you a drunkard ?' 'Yes, I 
am a drunkard.' 'Where are you going?' T am going to hell/ 
'Why?' 'Because the Good Book says 'No drunkard shall inherit 
the Kingdom of God,' and I am going to hell.' 

"Another man comes along and says : 'Are you a church mem- 
ber?' 'Yes, I am a church member.' 'Where are you going?' 
T am going to heaven.' 

"Say, if the man that drinks the whisky goes to hell, the man 
that votes for the saloon that sold the whisky to him will go to 
hell. If the man that drinks the whisky goes to hell and the man 
that sold whisky that he drank won't go to hell, if that man 
goes to heaven, then that poor drunkard will have the right to 
stand on the brink of eternal damnation and put his arms around 
the pillar of justice and shake his fist in the face of the Almighty 
and say: 'Unjust! Unjust!' If you vote for the dirty business 
you will go to hell as sure as you live. 

"Some fellow says : 'Drive the saloons out and the buildings will 
be empty.' Which would you rather have, empty buildings or empty 
jails and penitentiaries and insane asylums? We have got 
865,000 whisky orphans in the United States, enough to belt this 
globe three times around, punctured at every fifth point with a 
drunkard's widow. In all their squalor, want, and disgrace. 
Look at them painted on the canvas of your recollection. 

"Come on. Say, what is the matter with this grand old coun- 
try of ours? I heard my old friend, George Stewart, tell how he 
imagined he walked up to a mill and said : 'Hello, there, what kind 
of a mill are you?' 'A saw-mill.' 'What do you make?' 'We 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 133 

make boards out of logs.' 'Is the finished product worth more 
than the raw material?' 'Yes.' 'What is your power?' 'Wind, 
gasoline, electricity, steam.' 'Turn her on. We will make laws 
for you. We must have lumber for houses.' 

"Hey, what kind of a mill are you?' 'A grist-mill.' 'What do 
you make?' 'Flour and meal out of wheat and corn.' 'Is your 
finished product worth more than the raw material?' 'Yes.' 
I 'Come on, we will make laws for you. We will protect you. 
Canada, you keep your wheat out of here ; we want Decatur and 
Macon county and the corn belt to have a chance.' 

"What kind of a mill are you?' 'A paper-mill' 'What do 
you make paper out of?' 'Straw and rags/ 'Well, come on, we 
will make laws for you. We must have paper to write notes and 
mortgages and tracts on. Come on.' 

"Hey, what kind of a mill are you?' 'A gin-mill.' 'I don't 
like the looks nor the smell of you; a gin-mill. What do you 
make? What kind of a mill are you?' 'A gin-mill.' 'What is 
your raw material?' 'The boys of America.' The gin-mills of 
this country have got to have 2,000,000 boys or shut up shop. 
Say, walk down your streets and count the homes, and every fifth 
home has got to furnish a boy for a drunkard. Have you fur- 
nished yours? No. Then I have got to furnish two to make 
up. 

" T say, what is your raw material, saloons ?' 'American boys.' 
'Then I will pick the boys up and give them to you.' A man says : 
'Hold on, not that boy, he is mine.' Then I will say to you what 
a saloonkeeper said to me when I protested : T am not interested 
in boys. To hell with your boys.' 'Say, saloon gin-mill, what is 
your finished product?' 'Blear-eyed, puking, low-down, stagger- 
ing men and the scum of God's dirt, that have gone mad and 
taken the count.' 'What is your finished product?' Go to Jack- 
sonville, Kankakee, Joliet; go through the pens, and insane asy- 
lums, and homes for feeble-minded. Go to the jails. That is the 
finished product of your dirty business. 

"I tell you, it is the dirtiest business this side of hell and 
you know it. Listen, from the Saturday Evening Post of Novem- 
ber 9, 1907, an extract from a paper read by the brewer. Listen. 



134 Life and Labors of 

You will say a man didn't say that ; God pity you — they will say 
anything. Listen to what he said : 'It appears from these facts 
that the success of our business lies in the creation of appetite 
among the boys. Men who have formed the habit scarcely ever 
reform, but they, like others, will die, and unless there are recruits 
made to take their places, our coffers will be empty, and I recom- 
mend to you that money spent in the creation of appetite will 
return in dollars to your tills after the habit is formed.' 

" 'What is your raw material, saloons ?' 'American boys/ 
Say, I would not give one of those boys for all the distillers and 
saloons this side of hell, I don't care who you are. And they 
have got to have 2,000,000 boys every generation. And then you 
tell me you are a man when you vote for an institution like that. 
What do you want to do — pay taxes in money, or boys ? what do 
you want to do, you dirty whelps ? 

"I feel like an old fellow in Tennessee who made his living by 
catching rattlesnakes. He got one with fourteen rattles, and 
put it in a jar with a glass top. One day he was sawing wood, 
and his little five-year old boy, Jim, took the lid off, and the rat- 
tler wriggled out and struck him in the cheek. 

"He ran to his father and said: 'The rattler has bit me,' 
and the father ran and chopped the rattler to pieces, and with 
his jack knife he cut a chunk from the boy's cheek, and he 
sucked the poison. He looked at little Jim, and watched the 
pupils of the eyes dilate, and watched him swell three times his 
normal size, and watched his lips become parched and cracked, 
and his tongue loll from the mouth, and his eyes roll, and little 
Jim gasped and died. 

"And the father took him in his arms, and carried him over 
by the side of the rattler, and got on his knees and said: 'Oh, 
God, I would not give little Jim for all the rattlers that ever 
crawled over the Blue Ridge mountains.' And I would not 
give one of these boys for every dirty stinking dollar you get 
from the hell-soaked business, or from every brewer and dis- 
tiller this side of hell and damnation. 

"Listen. Up in South Dakota a preacher friend of mine sat at 
his breakfast table one Sunday morning. The doorbell rang, 



Rev. Wm, A. (Billy) Sunday 135 

and there stood a little boy 12 years of age. He stood there on 
crutches, shivering, and said: 'Please, sir, will you come up to 
the jail and talk and pray with papa? He murdered mamma. 
Papa was good and kind, but whisky did it, and I have got to 
support my three little sisters. I sell newspapers and black 
boots. Will you go up and talk and pray with papa? And will 
you come home, and be with us when they bring him back? 
The governor says we can have his body after they hang him.' 

"And the preacher hurried to the jail, and talked and prayed 
with the man. He had no knowledge of what he had done. 
He said: T don't blame the law, but, oh, it breaks my heart to 
think that my children must be left in a cold and heartless world. 
Oh, sir, whisky, whisky did it.' 

'The preacher was at the little hut when up drove the under- 
taker's w T agon, and they carried out the pine coffin. They led the 
little boy up to the coffin, and he leaned over and kissed his father 
and sobbed, and said to his sisters : 'Come on, sisters ; kiss 
papa's cheeks before they grow cold. Come on.' And the little 
hungry, ragged whisky orphans hurried to the coffin, shrieking 
in agony. Police whose hearts were like adamant, buried their 
faces in their hands and rushed from the house, and the preacher 
fell on his knees and lifted his clenched fist and tear-stained face, 
and took an oath before God, and before the whisky orphans, 
that he would fight the business until the undertaker carried him 
out in the coffin. 

"On Tuesday, the 7th of April, you men of Decatur have got 
the best chance to show your manhood of any town in the uni- 
verse. I have stood here preaching until I feel that I would 
drop dead. Then in the name of your pure mother and in the 
name of your manhood, in the name of your wife and the pure 
innocent children that climb up in your lap and put their arms 
around your neck, in the name of all that is good and noble ; say, 
shall we men of Illinois who hold in our hands the ballot and in 
that ballot hold the destiny of womanhood and children and 
manhood, shall we, the sovereign power who hold the ballot in 
our hands, shall we refuse to rally in the name of defenseless 
men and women and our native land? No. 



136 Life and Labors of 

"I want every man here today that will say 'God, you can count 
on me on April 7th to protect my wife, my home, my mother 
and children and manhood of Decatur.' I want every man here 
who will say 'you can count on me on that day' to stand up. 



And being in agony he prayed more earn- 
estly, and his sweat was as it were, great 
drops of blood, falling down to the ground. — 
Luke 22 :44. 

"The angels had beheld many wonderful scenes. They had 
seen the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah turned into heaps of 
ashes because of man's transgression. They had seen their breth- 
ren, angels who rebelled, hurled from the battlements of glory, but 
never had they beheld such a scene as they were called upon 
to witness, of Jesus Christ sweating drops of blood in the garden 
of Gethsemane. Infidels have seized upon various verses of 
scripture and given them as their reason for disbelieving. And 
the verse around which many battles have been fought is the one 
I have chosen this afternoon, for says the infidel : 'It is impossible 
for a man to sweat blood and still live/ 

"And yet Doctor Withrow, pastor of the Third Presbyterian 
church of Chicago, told a friend of mine, that he knew of a 
father who for nine years had heard nothing from his son, and 
when he did it was a telegram saying that the boy had been 
arrested, and charged with murder, and was sentenced to be 
executed that day. And Doctor Withrow said that the agony 
of that father was so intense, that blood oozed through the skin, 
proving that it is possible in our day. I don't intend to confine 
my remarks this afternoon to this scene but would like to deduce 
some lessons peculiarly applicable to this stage of the meeting 
and with your attention for a little while, I trust I can help you. 

"My first lesson is that the Divine cup is bitter, no matter who 
drinks it, whether fallen angels, or the unfallen Christ. Jesus 
Christ never sinned, and it was not bodily pain that made Him 
suffer, it was the mental agony. Jesus Christ knew the end of 
those who would reject Him, and His desire and longing to 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 137 

save others and the agony in His heart over the fact that men 
would repudiate Him and His knowledge of the damnation that 
waits for you if you reject Jesus Christ, brought such mental 
agony that He sweat drops of blood. So sin is a terrible thing. 
Jesus was not afraid to die. Multitudes have gone to the stake 
and been burned to ashes and did it with a smile on the face, 
and a song on the lips. So if Jesus had been afraid He would 
have been a coward, and not as brave as many who have died for 
Him. But it was the agony and distress over people rejecting 
Him, that wrung the blood from Him. So, listen, don't ever 
dream you will enter heaven without first of all being regenerated 
by repentance, and faith in Jesus Christ. If I ever had the least 
shadow of a doubt the existence of an eternal hell, it would all 
vanish, when I see Jesus Christ suffering in the Garden of Geth- 
semane. And whatever hell is, or wherever it is, I have no dis- 
position to test its reality, but it must be an awful place if God 
loved us well enough to open up a plan of redemption and send 
Jesus Christ to keep you out of hell if you would repent. 

"And don't be fool enough to go on and test the reality of hell, 
and don't ever insult God with a cold, heavy, formal word of 
prayer. Don't touch religion with the tip end of your fingers. 
If you can't grasp it firmly, let it alone. I think there must be 
something the matter with the religion of half of the people. I 
don't see how you can go along in the slipshod, happy-go-lucky 
'good-Lord, good-Devil' sort of way. 

"I learned this lesson, too. The power of prayer. Every 
man and woman used of God, have been men and women of 
prayer. I learn of the power of prayer. It is said of Jonathan 
Edwards that before he preached his sermon, 'Sinners in the 
hands of an angry God/ that for days he had not tasted food, or 
slept, and so powerful was the power of God, that when he 
preached the sermon, stubborn, old gray-haired reprobates that 
had resisted every effort, rose and cried: 'Oh, Mr. Edwards, 
spare us ! Spare us !' as he reached out and shook the old sinners 
over hell, and let them smell the brimstone. 

" 'Oh,' says a little two-by-four theolog, 'we preachers can't 
preach such doctrine.' 



138 Life and Labors of 

"Why, in the name of God, can't you. God Almighty has not 
changed any, and hell has not changed any, not a spark has gone 
out of the fire of hell. It is a lot of little jackasses that call 
themselves preachers that have changed, that is all. Say, we have 
a few days left in Decatur, stop arguing, stop discussing it, and 
go down and meet Decatur with tears and men will be swept into 
the kingdom of God. Just let the church of God get down on its 
knees, with hearts thawed out and you will move this town for 
Jesus Christ. I learn of the power of prayer. 

"Another lesson, too. The Bible is full of his spirit. I am 
not asking you to establish a precedent or to do something you 
have never done before. The interest shown in the word of 
God puts to shame the half-hearted way some people try to do 
the work of God in this world. Did you ever weep when you 
saw a sinner, or when you saw a man staggering down the street 
drunk ? Did you ever weep over the sins of the world and the sins 
of the church? 

"And then it shows me how God feels. People often ask me, 
'How do you suppose God feels ?' I know how God feels, and if 
God Almighty was no more concerned and anxious for Decatur 
to be saved than some of the people are, Decatur would have 
been in hell ages ago. Far in advance of any agony you ever had, 
the heart of God yearns to save you. I know how God feels 
because I know how Jesus feels ; I hear Him cry, 'Oh, Jerusalem ! 
Jerusalem ! How oft would I have gathered thy children together 
even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wing, and ye 
would not.' Tf thou hadst known in this thy day the things that 
belong to thy peace! Behold your house is left unto you deso- 
late !' * * * 

"And listen! We have no record that Jesus Christ ever gave 
the Jews another chance to accept Him as their Messiah. Oh, 
Decatur! If you only knew in this your day, this day, not 
Wednesday, but five weeks and a half of the greatest opportunity 
God ever rolled down the streets of a city ! If I should take my 
feelings as an earthly father, and multiply them by infinity, it 
might give me some idea of how God feels, about men and 
women going to hell. 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 139 

"And, another thing. Much concern will always move unsaved 
people and when you get right with God you will always be con- 
cerned about others and I believe this, that agonizing prayer will 
do what nothing else in the world will do. 

"I learn another lesson, and that is the possibility of the 
human soul. I never look at a man or woman, but that 1 think 
that they are a locked-up casket of possibilities, and all you need is 
the touch of God on you. I say, all you need is to have God touch 
your life, and transform it, and then you will become all God 
has in His plan about you. We are all a part of God's plan, and 
just so far as you refuse to serve God just so far is God's plan 
perverted. 

"I think of Moody, who won hundreds of thousands to Jesus, 
and of Finney, who led at least a million into the kingdom ; and 
I think of Voltaire, who became an infidel by committing to 
memory when a boy a poem on infidelity, and became a great 
infidel, and today men are stumbling over his polished shafts into 
hell. 

"If you are not brought to Jesus Christ in these days God pity 
you. God pity any member of a church that won't get under 
the burden, and help to lift it, and you will find that men and 
women that God has used to light up the dark places of the earth 
have preached eternal damnation, and the certainty of judgment, 
and the certainty of hell. 

"I have been honored of God to take over 100,000 people by the 
hand, and lead them to Christ, and yet there is nothing that 
thrills me today like seeing a man take his stand for Jesus. I can 
not describe the feeling that comes to me. I can't describe it, 
and I cannot understand why people are not enthused over 
people being converted. 

"It seems to me that Jesus Christ is in a hurry to save this 
town. Nothing will produce joy in heaven like the salvation of 
a soul. The bells in heaven don't ring when some fellow corners 
the wheat market, or you are elected to some office, but should 
you go to a sinner and tell him that Jesus Christ died to save 
him, and bring him to Jesus, there would be joy in the presence 
of the angels of God over one sinner that repents. I tell you 



14° Life and Labors of 

they must be going it some up in heaven today. I tell you hell is 
groggy this afternoon. I can just imagine that they are gathered 
in conclave, wondering what they can do to stop this great tidal 
wave of religion that is sweeping down these streets. 

"God be praised, that I can do something to make my Savior 
feel His mission on earth was not in vain. Cannot you pray 
more earnestly for the unsaved of Decatur. Cannot you help 
to lift a little bit in these last days, for God, and God's truth ?" 



Because I have called, and ye have refused; 
I have stretched out my hand and no man 
hath regarded; but ye have set at nought all 
my counsel, and would none of my reproof: 
I also will laugh in the day of your calamity : 
I will mock when your fear cometh; when 
your fear cometh as desolation and destruc- 
tion, and your calamity cometh as a whirl- 
wind; then shall they call upon me but I will 
not answer; for they that hated knoivlcdge, 
and did not choose the fear of the Lord. 
They would none of my counsel, and de- 
spised my reproof, therefore shall they eat of 
the fruit of their own way, and be filled with 
their own devices. — Prov. 1 :24-29. 

For if we sin wilfully, after we receive 
knowledge of the truth there remains no more 
sacrifice for sin. 

"The truth is that man is a sinner, and Jesus Christ offers to be 
his saviour, and knowledge of that truth comes from the Bible, 
and song, and sermons. If we sin wilfully after we receive 
knowledge of the truth why there remaineth no more sacrifice for 
sin. A man seems to think because he does not believe in the 
Bible, or Jesus, or heaven or hell that he can go right on sinning, 
and thinking that his statement that he does not believe will 
make him immune from any punishment consequent upon diso- 
bedience. He is a fool. 

"If we sin wilfully after we receive knowledge of the truth, 
God has no other Son to offer, or plan to propose. It is Jesus 
Christ or nothing. 'He that despised Moses' law died without 
mercy.' And if some of you old gray-haired sinners that sit 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 141 

here had been under Moses' law you would have been killed 
before you got gray-haired, and you are under the dispensation 
of Grace today. 'He that despised Moses' law died without 
mercy. Of how much surer punishment shall ye be judged 
worthy who hath trodden under foot the blood of the Son.' You 
deserve to be killed if you trample under foot the blood of Jesus 
Christ. 

"I have two verses for my text, Matt. 12:31-32 — 'Wherefore 
I say unto you all manner of sin and blasphemy against the 
Holy Spirit shall not be forgiven unto men. And whosoever 
speaketh a word against the Son of Man it shall be forgiven 
him, but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost it shall not 
be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to 
come.' I don't know where the doctrine for future probation 
comes in, 'neither in this world, nor in the world to come; hath 
never forgiveness,' God says. 

"Now the Pharisees charged Jesus with being in league with 
the Devil. They said to Him: 'You have a devil.' Later on 
they grew bolder and said: 'Why, you are a devil, you do what 
you do through Beelzebub, the Prince of Devils.' Jesus said: 
'How do you figure that out? "A house that is divided against 
itself cannot stand," and if what I do I do by Beelzebub, the 
Prince of Devils, how do you explain that I am overthrowing 
the work of the Devil?' He drove them into a corner and they 
did not try to answer His logic any more. 

"I am aware of the fact that various opinions are held by men 
and women as to what they imagine, or think, constitutes the 
sin against the Holy Spirit. Some think that it could have been 
committed only by those who saw Jesus Christ. If that be true 
neither you nor I are in danger, for we never saw nor spoke to 
Jesus Christ. Still another class think it has been committed 
since the days of Jesus, but at extremely rare intervals. And a 
third class thinks they have committed this sin, and they live in 
dread of the future. Now then I think there are thousands that 
will come under the head of my message. They are never 
gloomy ; their conscience is at best and life seems to be all laugh- 
ter and song to them. 



142 Life and Labors of 

"If you will do me this favor, please lay aside any precon- 
ceived ideas which you have, as to what constitutes the sin 
against the Holy Spirit, and I will try to answer a few questions. 
I have read every sermon that I could get hold of, and heard 
every preacher that I could, and studied much, and will give my 
result. I will try to ask and answer a few questions. 

"What is it? How can it be committed? How does it show 
itself? and How may I know that I committed it? and Why will 
not God forgive it? I will tell you what it is not. It is not 
swearing. If it were swearing, lots of men in heaven would 
have to come out and go to hell. It is not drunkenness. Some 
of the brightest lights that have ever blazed for God He pulled 
out of the quagmire of the flesh, and many men started heaven- 
ward would have to turn toward hell. There are men that are 
sitting here tonight that are redeemed by the power of God, that 
would have to lose your faith in God. It is not murder — Paul's 
hands were red with blood. It is not adultery; Jesus Christ said 
to the woman: 'Neither do I condemn thee. Go, and sin no 
more.' 

"To me it is just as plain and common and simple. It is 
constant rejection of Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour. 
God's offer of mercy comes to you, and you say 'No !' I don't 
care how many times you may say 'No !' and God still bear with 
you, but I do know that God gives every man a last chance. He 
says so in His Word. I do not know when that time takes 
place. You cannot set any time for the last time. But as God 
strives with man today, and you say 'No' — it may mean an 
eternal 'No.' You must have eyes in the back of your head, or 
you must be an imbecile, if you cannot see that the Spirit of God 
Almighty is moving upon Decatur, as you have never witnessed 
in all history. 

"Over in Scotland there are men who make a living by gath- 
ering eggs of birds laid way down on ledges of rock. They 
fasten a rope to their bodies, and swing down upon the ledges of 
rock. When a certain man was doing that and gathering eggs, 
the rope became untied and he gave himself up to the fate which 
he felt awaited him, when a breeze freshened from the sea and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 143 

started a vibration of the rope, and he staggered to the edge of the 
rock and said : 'That is my one hope. And if I leap and miss it, 
I die.' And as the rope swung he rushed, and leaped, and seized 
it, and made his way hand over hand, and when at last he stag- 
gered to the top, his hair was as white as the driven snow. 

'The one cord that swings through this old world tonight is 
the Holy Spirit and when you turn the Spirit down, you will seal 
your doom. You are wrapped up in business and politics or you 
are absorbed in society. It is no special act in your life. No 
special form of sin. There is no sin that God will not ask you 
to give up for the last time. It may be drunkenness and if you 
don't give up your whisky bottle that last time it will be your 
doom in hell. It is no one glaring act of pleading with you to 
give up that sin, and you keep saying, 'No/ until the time comes 
when God will ask of you for the last time, and then let you alone. 

"I believe that there are men in Decatur just as truly damned 
as though they were in hell tonight. And people in this taber- 
nacle just as truly damned as though they were in hell instead 
of sitting here. God says, 'My spirit will not always strive with 
man/ No one act, but constant repetition of the same thing. 
By very well known laws of the mind, your conversion must be 
affected through the influence of the truth on your mind. It is 
also a known law of the mind that truth resisted loses power on 
the mind that resists, and each resistance strengthens the mind 
and weakens the truth. 

"Every time that you hear the truth and resist it that same 
truth is weaker with you. Hear, and you become stronger in 
ability to say 'No/ Every time that you indulge in a habit that 
habit grows stronger and you grow weaker. There are those 
here who would gouge out their right eye if they only knew 
it would liberate them from some sin. Now no matter what 
Jesus said or did, the Jews repudiated and spurned Him. He 
stepped to the grave of Lazarus and said, 'Come forth.' And 
He said to the Jews : Ts that enough to prove that I am the Son 
of God ?' and they said : 'Away with Him.' 

"No matter what sermons, or who pleads with you, or who 
sings, you refuse to accept until God will ask you for the last 



144 Life and Labors of 

time to do it. 'My Spirit will not always strive with man.' That 
does not mean the Spirit will be withdrawn from the world in 
general for when that takes place the world ends. God says 'My 
Spirit shall not always strive with you as an individual.'' 

"A woman who used to be in a Methodist church in Indiana 
told this incident. She was working in a town, and preached, 
and in one of the meetings a young lady, a leader of society, 
she tried to induce to be a Christian but she spurned her. And 
the last night of the meeting came, and my friend went down 
and talked with her, but she said, 'No/ Later she saw her turn 
to her companion and draw a pencil, and pull out a hymn book, 
and write something on the fly leaf. She went and pleaded with 
her again; but she still said 'No.' Eight months afterwards my 
friend went back to this same town, and they said : 'You remem- 
ber Miss So and So; well she is dying. Won't you go and see 
her ?' 

"As my friend entered the bedroom and the girl saw her, she 
turned her face to the wall, and said: "I didn't send for you; 
you are too late. If you will go to the church where you held the 
meetings and find the hymn book, you will learn the reason.' 
They got the book, and on the fly leaf they found this written: 
T will run the risk ; I will take my chance.' When she wrote that 
and dropped the book the Spirit of God left that quick. It was 
the last call that God ever gave her. You never hear a sermon 
preached that God does not call somebody for the last time to 
turn from sin. 

" 'W T ho can commit it?' I used to think only an immoral man 
or the lowest down people on earth, but listen. Who did Jesus 
Christ warn? The Pharisees, and who were they? The people 
with the best morals. There is not a man that is looking in my 
face who has a higher standard of morality than the Pharisees in 
the days of Jesus. You may be man enough to defend all that is 
noble, and defend this meeting and you may be my best friend, 
and you may believe in the Bible and religion, but let God try to 
get into your heart and induce you to walk down this aisle and 
get an acknowledgment from you that you believe that you are 
a sinner, and your heart and your lips are sealed, and God cannot 
get in. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 145 

"What is the work of the Holy Spirit? To save your soul? 
No ; you sit there and hear a sermon, and something in you says, 
'I ought to be a better man/ What is that? That is the Spirit 
of God striving to pull you out of sin, and you resist every influ- 
ence brought to bear to do it. Then you say : 'Well, I ought to 
do that/ And at last you are induced to yield, and you ask God 
for Christ's sake, to forgive your sins. It took the Holy Spirit 
to convict, and the blood of Jesus Christ to open the plan of 
redemption, and it takes God to pardon you. In other words, it 
takes the Trinity to keep you out of sin. 

"Don't sneer at sin. It is the most damnable thing on earth. 
God has spoken to this world in three dispensations. He spoke 
through the Judges, and through the Prophets of old. He spoke 
through Jesus Christ, and the Jews killed Jesus, and today He is 
speaking through the Holy Spirit, the last dispensation that 
God will ever work, and when this closes it is all over with you. 
And I don't know how near we are to the closing of it either. 
When anybody says that they believe that it is near, they always 
put it far enough ahead so that they will be sure to die before it 
takes place. I don't know. 

"How does it show itself? How can I know? Listen! It 
shows itself usually in one of two ways. There are many sub- 
divisions of each. First, bitter malignity. Take a man that has 
sinned away the day of grace, and you have heard men in this town 
say that there is nothing that so disturbs them and makes them so 
mad as to hear that this tabernacle is packed night after night, 
Bitter malignity. And there is not a man in Decatur that they will 
say meaner, more scurrilous things about than I. I will not con- 
promise with sin, but I love the sinner. I am not fighting him 
but sin, that damns him, and if in order to fight the sin I have 
got to be your enemy, then I will take your enmity. Bitter ma- 
lignity. 

"An old saint of God was holding meetings in New York and 
the last night a young man came down and asked him to pray 
for him. But that was all that he would do. The meetings 
closed and eleven years afterward that same old man was in 
Philadelphia and went to a hotel to see a man and while his card 
10 



146 Life and Labors of 

was being sent up he stepped past the door of the bar room and 
saw a man pouring out a glass of whisky. And he was reflected 
in the mirror so that the man who was about to take the drink 
of whisky saw him and he turned and set the whisky down, and 
came to the door and said, 'Is not your name so and so, and do 
you remember me, and do you remember holding meetings in 
New York eleven years ago?' 'Yes, I remember holding the 
meetings.' 'Do you remember a young man that came to you 
the last night and asked you to pray for him? 'No, I don't 
believe that I do.' 'Well, I was that young man.' 'Well, ' said the 
old man, 'I should hope that you had settled the matter, but by 
your presence here I should judge not.' 'No/ said the man, 'I 
have not. I believe that there is a hell, and I am going to spend 
eternity there. If Jesus would walk in that door now, I would 
push Him from me and spit in His face.' 'Don't say that. Don't 
talk that way.' 'But/ he said, 'if you will give me a Bible now I 
will tear it up/ 'I never heard such talk. I would not believe 
that a man could get so low down. Promise me that you will 
pray/ 'I will do nothing of the kind.' And with an oath he 
walked back to the bar and drank several glasses of whisky and 
then threw down the money and went out pouring forth oaths. 
Bitter malignity. 

"It don't always show itself that way. Sometimes it comes out 
in utter indifference. Sermons will fall as unheeded on the ears 
as though you were a mummy or as though you preached in the 
graveyard to a lot of tombstones. A man stood here this after- 
noon and on each side of him were two women weeping and plead- 
ing. First one would plead with him and then the other and he stood 
and laughed and mocked and sneered. I should think a man with 
one spark of manhood in him if he had one scintilla of decency 
in him could not have met those appeals and those tears and 
pleadings of his own flesh and blood with laughter. Now in 
these days of revelry and jest, as I go up and down the land I 
never heard any of these old geezers call Bob Ingersoll a grafter 
when he sneered and puked at God, and ripped the Bible up and 
threw it away and undermined their faith in Him, and he would 
get $500 and $600 a night for doing it. In his days on earth 



Rev. Win. A. (Billy) Sunday 147 

Ingersoll said, 'If God cannot forgive sin, He is not divine. 
If He will not forgive, he is not lovable.' 

"Is that so? God says: 'All manner of sins I will forgive.' 
Listen. That He is divine, you know and I know, that He is 
lovable you and I know. He says all manner of sin and blas- 
phemy will be forgiven. But He says if you go on you will never 
be forgiven in this world nor in the world to come, so settle your 
own destiny. 'All manner of sin.' Suppose there is here tonight 
a thief, will God forgive you? He says, 'all manner of sin I will 
forgive.' 

"When Wanamaker was postmaster-general of the United 
States, one day he received a letter like this: 'My dear sir— I 
send you today a bundle of half bills. (The man had taken some 
money and cut the bills in two in the middle). I send you today 
half bills to the amount of $1,500 to be sent to the treasury of the 
United States to be matched with half bills that they have there. 
I defrauded the government postoffice twelve years ago, and I 
want to return the money and right the wrong.' 'All manner of 
sin' — so don't let that keep you away from God Almighty. You 
have got some money in your pocket that don't belong to you, 
give it back and tell God you want to square up, and he will 
forgive you. 

"All manner of sin He will forgive. A man was traveling 
through France and the first place he visited was the Louvre. 
Everybody who goes to France visits two places, always the tomb 
of Napoleon and the Louvre. He looked upon those paintings, 
magnificent masterpieces, and he stood in front of a painting and 
looked and looked at the face of Jesus. The guide touched him 
on the shoulder and said: 'You are like all other tourists, you 
stand and look at the face of Christ; look at the face of the 
kneeling woman at his feet/ He lowered his eyes and looked 
at the woman ; it was Mary Magdelene out of whom he had cast 
the devil. However much the enmity of the people against 
Christ, they could not drive her away from Him. All manner of 
sin will be forgiven. 

"A friend of mine was preaching out in Iowa one time and a 
man came to him after the meeting and said, 'Will you talk to 



148 Life and Labors of 

me for half an hour?' My friend said he wouldn't for $50; he 
said he was so tired. The man said: 'I have been here to the 
meetings every night for eight nights and I haven't closed my 
eyes and I haven't tasted food, and I think I will die.' My friend 
told him to come to his room at 10 o'clock and he would give 
him five minutes. The man said: 'If I am alive I will be there.' 

"The next morning at 10 o'clock there was a rap at my friend's 
door. He said, 'Step in.' And in stepped the man with whom 
he had had the conversation the night before. My friend said: 
''Well, sir, what can I do for you?' The fellow said, 'I am a 
murderer.' 'Stop, I can't sit here and listen to you for I would 
become an accessory after the fact, I can't listen to your story 
without telling the officers.' The man said: T know all about 
that and I am ready to go on the scaffold or I am ready to go 
to the penitentiary for life, and I will die if I keep this to myself. 
I feel better after having told just this much.' 'Well, with the 
understanding that I can make known to the officials you can 
go ahead with your story. Otherwise, I don't want to hear what 
you have to say.' So with that understanding the man told his 
story. 

"My friend telephoned to the county seat and told the sheriff 
to come up, and told him the circumstances. He said to the man : 
'Will you make your confession public?' He said, T will/ My 
friend called him to the platform before he preached and he told 
the people his story. The audience shrank back as they heard it, 
the sheriff put him under arrest, and they sat there and listened 
to the sermon and after it was over took him to jail. The sheriff 
got into communication with the authorities in Colorado and 
asked if the story he had told was so. They wired back that 
every word of the confession was true but that three of the prin- 
cipal witnesses had died and two had moved away and after a 
search they could not be located, and they sent back word that if 
that man had made an acknowledgment himself and was living 
right they were willing to let the matter drop. 

"That man joined the church and two years ago when my 
friend went back to that town he was still there a blazing witness 
for Jesus Christ. All manner of sin and blasphemy God says 'I 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 149 

will forgive.' Then why sit there with God's condemnation rest- 
ing upon you? 

"I tell you when that angry mob nailed Jesus Christ to the 
cross, if they had asked Him then to forgive them He would have 
done it as sure as you breathe. 

"But some people say, 'Mr. Sunday, how does it happen that so 
few aged men and women are converted?' Listen. After a per- 
son has become developed through age and contact with the world 
and experience and has passed the period of enthusiasm and pas- 
sion it is hard for him to change his manner of living. How does 
it happen that so few aged men and women are converted? 
Infidels are always nosing around picking some small flaw in 
religion but that is no argument against religion; but God 
reveals himself to you and you will do His will. All know that 
the older a person becomes the less susceptible he is to the appeals 
of others. That is no argument against religion. 

"Don't you know this, that most people are converted before 
they are thirty years of age. Don't you know that about 17 of 
20 are converted before they are 20, and 18 out of 20 before they 
are 30. How many men and women who are here tonight are 
professing Christians? (About 4,000 people raised their hands). 

"Tell you another thing. Most people are converted during a 
time of revivals. How many professing Christians gave their 
hearts to God during some special meeting. I mean outside of the 
ordinary church? Now how many took their stand for Jesus 
Christ under the ordinary routine of the church ? All right, what 
does that prove ? It proves this : That if you are not converted 
at a revival the chances are that you are going to hell. Don't 
you pay any attention to a sneering infidel ; God bless your hearts, 
they are like an old Spanish proverb, 'Spit against the wind and 
you spit in your own face.' That is evidence. 

"Listen ! Why won't God forgive it ? I will ask this question 
then I will quit. He says He never will neither in this world nor 
in the world to come; He says He never will. Now, if you injure 
me and I say I forgive you you might say that I had a good 
spirit. 

"I will say this : if God spares my life until next Monday night 



150 Life and Labors of 

when I leave this town to begin work at another place, in spite of 
all the mean things that are said about me while I am in Decatur, 
I will not carry away with me malice nor enmity. I have taken 
twenty years to build up my reputation and if any man tried to 
tear it down he can congratulate himself on having a scrap on his 
hands. But I will not carry away with me any enmity in my 
heart toward you. 

"If you should injure my loved ones and break up my home ; 
if you should alienate my wife's affections, I might say I would 
forgive you, although I will not promise that I would, for I would 
have to pray hard to keep from putting a bullet in you. Don't 
try it, anyway. 

"Now, God says: 'Look here, you can spurn my love and 
trample the blood of my only begotten Son under your feet, and 
turn your back on Him if you want to, but I will never forgive 
you.' God says He will never forgive that sin, neither in this 
world nor in the world to come. Reject Jesus Christ and turn 
your back on Him and you are forever doomed. 

"When the Jews were on their way to the promised land, going 
down through the wilderness, the men complained of the food 
that God gave them and He sent serpents among them and they 
were bitten and many people died. Then they rushed to Moses 
and asked Moses to intercede. God said: 'No, get out of the 
way; let me get over there at them and I will kill them. After 
all I have done for them.' Moses says: 'Hold on, God.' He 
says: 'If you kill them, the Egyptians will laugh at you and say 
you brought them out in the wilderness and couldn't take care 
of them and they will have the horse laugh on you. Don't do 
it.' 

"Well/ God said, 'all right, Moses, go ahead; but I will tell 
you what they have got to do. Go raise a brass serpent on a pole, 
and all that shall look upon it, who have been bitten by a snake, 
will be cleansed. They have got to do that.' 

"Now for the sake of argument, here is a fellow who is swelled 
up and chesty and heady. He is a little two by four tin-horn pro- 
fessor. Now for the sake of argument, here is a fellow bitten by 
a serpent, he goes down the road and he meets a friend and he 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 151 

says: 'I have been bitten by a serpent; .what shall I do for it?' 
'Go look at the brass serpent/ 'Oh, not much, I don't understand 
the philosophical connection of looking at a brass serpent and 
cleaning a snake bite. I won't do it.' 

"Now for the sake of argument, a man won't do it because he 
don't understand it. Few people understand how your food is 
assimilated ; there are few people who understand how the medi- 
cine they take builds up the tissue and restores their health. 
They don't understand it but they take the medicine any way. 
All that is asked of you is to do that. 

"The man who is poisoned; the pupils of his eyes are dilated 
and his body swells, his tongue thickens. What is he going to do ? 
Look at the brass serpent upon the pole. He won't do it himself. 
You won't go down to the front and accept Jesus Christ, then 
God Almighty won't pardon you. You say, T am going to wait 
until the meetings are over and then, join the church.' You are 
a sneak. There must be some other way. You say, 'Why, I saw 
a harlot go down and a thief. Must I go down with them ?' Yes, 
you have got to go down with them. God hasn't got one way for 
you, and another way for her and him. You have got to, or go to 
hell. It is the same for the judge on the bench and the prisoner be- 
hind the bar. It is through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ 
for all. 

"Now I have got two words in closing. One a word of comfort. 
If you are here tonight and you have in your heart a desire to be 
a Christian, that is evidence that the opportunity hasn't left you. 
If you are here and you have a desire in your heart to be a 
Christian I beg and plead of you to encourage it, it may be your 
last chance. It may be the last, when you go to the door after 
hearing this sermon tonight. 

"You will agree with me that I have not made it necessary for 
you to use your handkerchiefs. I haven't told of any death-bed 
scenes ; but I try to show you that religion is the most reasonable 
thing in the world. It isn't a matter of simply crying and blow- 
ing your nose. That isn't it at all. Accept religion and you 
are a reasonable man; sneer at it, and you are a fool. 

"I will give you a word of comfort and a word of warning, so 



152 Life and Labors of 

God help you. I feel in closing this message tonight somewhat 
like a nurse must have felt at the close of the battle of Franklin. 
A soldier had his arm shot off by a cannon ball and it necessitated 
amputation. The operation was successful and after it was over 
the surgeon said to the nurse: 'That was a difficult operation 
and he has come out of it in fine shape and that boy has made a 
grand fight, and I don't want to see him die. If you need me, 
send for me/ The surgeon threw himself down on a cot and was 
soon asleep. He was worn out by his long and ceaseless vigil. 

"Presently the stump began to bleed, and the nurse sent for the 
surgeon. He came and he said: 'Let me see it.' When they had 
removed the bandage he said that is a vein. I can take that up, 
but if it had been an artery I couldn't have done anything for 
it. He has lost so much blood now that if the artery starts he 
would not live long.' He fastened up the end of the vein and 
said to the nurse: Tf I am needed, send for me; I am so inter- 
ested in that boy because he has made such a grand fight/ The 
surgeon lay down on the cot again and was no sooner asleep 
than the stump began to bleed again. The nurse sent for him. 
He came and looked at the arm and said: 'That is an artery and 
he will soon bleed to death.' 

"I feel in some such a position as he. I said today, and I have 
said since I came upon this platform, I am standing here with my 
thumb in the artery and many men and women will tonight deter- 
mine whether it is heaven or hell with them. 

"I have been a Christian for twenty years and I have still got 
a desire to please God and to keep on every day reading the 
Bible and praying and every day doing something for God, and 
I am going to keep on encouraging that desire to be a Christian 
and I am going to encourage it all I can. 

"Listen to me, if you have no desire and care nothing about it, 
keep your seat, so we can see you and leave you alone. I don't 
want anybody to spend their time on you if you have no desire, 
but if you have a desire to be a Christian, although you may sleep 
on a prayerless pillow tonight, I want every man and woman in 
this building to stand up ; if you have no desire keep your seat/' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 153 



The effectual fervent prayer of a right- 
eous man availeth much. — James 5:16. 

"Mrs. Browning asked Charles Kingsley what caused him to 
lead such a beautiful and attractive life, and he replied: 'Why, 
I have a friend.' If you can stand on the street corner and say 
of all who pass by, 'They are my friends,' you are to be congrat- 
ulated but if you can look into the face of a man and say, 'All 
the world is my friend,' and looking into the heavens and not say, 
'God is my friend,' you have made a great mistake. I care noth- 
ing about friendship of the world if I know I am pleasing God 
and have His sign of approval. 

"There are two ways in which blessing will come from a life 
of prayer. First, reflex blessing; second, in the direct blessing 
which comes to you as a result of the life of prayer. 

"Henry Drummond tells of a young lady who was prepossess- 
ing and attractive and she was often asked for the secret but 
each time she refused to reveal it, always replying, 'wait until I 
am dead; then pry open the locket which hangs about my neck 
and you will discover the secret ;' and when at last she died they 
pried open trie locket and found this verse of Scripture, 'Whom 
having not seen I love.' Such is the transforming power of 
prayer and I am talking from experience. 

"Prayer helps us to realize the presence of God. I realize the 
presence of God when I pray as I do not at any other time. 'In 
the secret of His presence how my soul delights to hide.' In the 
busy marts of trade, behind the counter selling your wares, in the 
homes and wherever we are, prayer will help us to realize the 
presence of God. 

"Prayer helps you realize your dependence upon God. Jesus 
spent whole nights in prayer and as He would come down from 
His all-night vigils multitudes pressed upon Him for healing 
power and virtue went out from Him. It was after one of His 
all-night vigils and as a result of prayer that He did three impor- 
tant things in His life ; first, He asked twelve men to be His dis- 
ciples ; second, the people pressed upon Him for His healing and 
He fed the 5,000 hungry in the desert; third, He sat and taught 



154 Life and Labors of 

those matchless precepts that we call the Sermon on the Mount, 
the like of which the world has never heard and never will hear 
again. 

"When you get up from your knees you are not likely to look 
at the world as you would through the bottom of a beer glass. 
Who are the people whose souls are most open and responsive, 
my friends, to the spirit now ? I tell you it isn't the beer-drinking, 
card-playing Sunday-golf-playing crowd of church-goers. It is 
the crowd who are upholding the hands of the preacher in the 
prayer meeting. 

"Prayer opens the soul and makes it responsive and receptive 
to the influence of God. I pity many a preacher for the gang he has 
got to talk to. I only wish for the sake of some people that you 
would just turn me loose on that gang for about a week. Many 
a preacher wants to win souls to Jesus Christ, but he is handi- 
capped, and his hands are tied by a Godless card-playing crowd. 
They have got a lot of people in the church that never darkened 
the doors of a prayer meeting. They said they couldn't come out. 
You have hobbled out and butted into that crowd for five weeks 
and now you can go to prayer meeting if you want to. I want 
the preachers to come up and take a good look at some of the 
church members, for they will never see them again. If they 
want to see you they will have to go to some card party or grog 
shop or out on the Sunday golf links for they will never see you 
in church or at a prayer meeting. 

"You can't honestly pray, 'Thy kingdom come,' and vote the 
whisky ticket. If you offer that prayer and vote the whisky 
ticket, you are a contemptible liar. You can't pray, 'Thy king- 
dom come/ and then do everything in your power to prevent it 
from coining. So whenever you offer that prayer it is a lie if you 
don't mean it. 

"It is so with your prayer list. You can't honestly pray for the 
salvation of your husband and friends and not turn every stone 
to lead them to Christ. Your prayers are worth no more than 
you are willing to redeem in work. 

"Prayers are costly. God will hold you to them. Livingston 
prayed and God said: 'Ycu pack your grip and go to Africa.' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 155 

John G. Pa'yton prayed, and God sent him to the New Hebrides. 
I have got more respect for a man who shoves a gun under my 
nose than a man who writes an anonymous letter, and prayer 
without an effort God treats like I do the anonymous letters. 
When I see an unsigned letter I never read it, I just rip it up. 
David Brainard prayed and God said: 'Go to the Indians. 
Answer your own prayer.' 

"Prayer leads to activity. You can't honestly pray: 'Save my 
hoy,' and then not do anything in your power to further that end. 
There are men and women looking in my face who are not trying 
to get their prayers answered. There are some church members 
iii Decatur who have not been to one of these meetings. It's up 
to you to labor as well as pray. You will never see such a move- 
ment of the Spirit of God for a generation or more. It isn't 
given to a community to witness such a tidal wave as is now 
passing through Decatur. Never has it been easier to talk religion 
and if God's people don't fully come up to their opportunities, 
God pity them. 

"Prayer impresses men with the character and goodness of 
God and produces a corresponding desire to be like God. How 
do I know that God will answer prayer? There is an argument 
from the standpoint of instinct. Who told the robin to come back 
to Decatur, that frosts and snow were gone? Who told the bee 
to fly three miles to the clover patch and fly back with unerring 
instinct to its hive? You know if the hive were moved fifty feet 
while it was gone it would fly to the spot but would not know 
enough to go that fifty feet. Who tells the squirrel to lay up 
nuts in the North, when if the same squirrel were 'taken to the 
South it would not do so. If God won't disappoint a bird, bee 
or a squirrel, he will grant your request when you ask Him. 
If God is great and good and is disposed to bless why should he 
require me to ask? Why don't He give? It is advantageous to 
you. 

"We grow by expression. When I first started out to be a 
Christian I couldn't stand up in a prayer meeting and use three 
sentences consecutively but I made it a rule to speak whenever I 
got a chance and so I overcame my natural diffidence. God wants 



156 Life and Labors of 

to develop us according to nature. As for instance the parent and 
child. The child is taught to ask the parent. When the child 
comes to the parent and asks for bread does he give him a stone ? 
Don't you think you know more than God? God wants you to 
pray because it is natural. God wants you to pray because it is 
necessary. 

"When I was young I was weak physically, but through the 
Y. M. C. A. and under the best physical directors I now have 
as fine a physique as you ever saw. I can put nine-tenths of you 
fellows in your coffin yet. I work hard while some of you sit 
around and do nothing for Jesus Christ. The more I give up to 
prayer and the study of the word of God the more I develop 
spiritually. Remember you are blessed in proportion to your 
obedience and your capacity to receive. I believe in experimental 
religion. Half of the people don't know what it is to be con- 
verted. All they know about prayer they read in a book. 

"Prayer is assurance. 'All things whatsoever ye desire ask and 
ye shall receive them.' There are immediate as well as deferred 
answers to prayer. Daniel's answer to prayer was deferred twen- 
ty-three days. When you start praying the Devil sends somebody 
to delay the answer. The Devil is working just as hard to damn 
old Decatur as Jesus Christ is working to save her. Mr. Fischer 
and I came to a town in Indiana ; men met us as we got off the 
train and one said: 'I am president of a praying band of fifty- 
five men and women who are pledged to pray three times a day 
during the meetings. We will die for the meetings if necessary. 
If you will call me up any hour of the day or night we will come 
to your help, every one of us, and pray and pull it through what- 
ever the trouble may be.' And we saw the power of God get 
hold of that old town like a cyclone would a straw stack. There 
is nothing too hard for God if the church will get on her face and 
pray. Hannah prayed to be the mother of a child (she wanted 
a baby, not a poodle dog) and God heard and answered her prayer, 
and she became the mother of Samuel." 

Mr. Sunday spoke of the effect of prayer during the boxer 
uprising in China when they started a fire in the enclosure of the 
missionaries confined in Pekin, and they prayed for rain and it 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 157 

rained day and night for two weeks; and of the grasshopper 
siege in Minnesota when ex-Gov. Pillsbury appointed a day for 
fasting and prayer for relief and God answered their prayer; of 
the siege of Leyden when the fleet taking provisions for their re- 
lief could not get within three miles. They prayed for God for 
deliverance. God blew his breath against the North Sea and 
flooded up to the walls of the citadel with eighteen feet of water ; 
they stripped the ships and He blew them back to the North Sea 
and the water has never flooded that land since that day. It was 
God's answer. 

"Are you a praying Christian or is God dead? You don't talk 
to Him any more like you used to. There is now power like prayer. 
The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.' 
God will do great things in these latter days of this meeting, 
Friday, Saturday and the Sabbath." 



And ye will not come to me that ye might 
have lifef— John 5:40. 

"I think of all the words that ever fell from the lips of Jesus 
of which we have record to my mind this is among the saddest. 
I have often wished I could have sat and looked into His face and 
heard His voice. I have often wished somebody had reproduced 
upon canvas the sad expression of this face. I wish that I could 
have sat there and listened to the colloquy that was wrung from 
His lips in His address to the men that egged and dogged His 
footsteps. From every evidence that God could bring, raising the 
dead, cleansing the lepers, and everything that He did, they turned 
a deaf ear and a blind eye. They made excuses why they didn't 
accept of Him, and finally Jesus summed it up in this: 'Ye will 
. not come unto me that ye might have life.' So people are lost be- 
' cause they will not come to Christ and if any man or women 
goes out of this tabernacle tonight and goes beyond the pale of 
mercy it will be for the same reason. God came to you and 
offered salvation and you spurned it and after you have run the 
earthly career and gone into the grave, then you will just think 
over your life and remember the things that kept you from taking 



158 Life and Labors of 

your stand for Christ and you will think what a fool you were 
to do it. 

"Nobody is lost because he needs to be lost, because the salva- 
tion of Jesus Christ covers all the sins of all the people. He 
tasted death for every man. Man is not lost because of any pur- 
pose or decree on the part of God. God does not say, 'You can- 
not be saved and you can be damned.' God knew before you 
were born, God knew the first time that your mother kissed you 
that you were going to hell and yet God gives you a chance to go 
to heaven and God offers salvation. God knew the name of every 
man that is going to do it, God knows that some won't do it, and 
that some will do it and God puts it up to you. God gives every- 
body a chance. 'Whosoever will may come.' 

"We are not lost because of the purpose or decree of God ; God 
gives you a chance to do it. All who come unto Him may be 
saved. He does not wish any to perish. We all deserve hell if 
we got our just deserts, for salvation does not come as a reward 
of merit. Everybody is weak, but God's strength is made perfect 
in weakness. Don't look at your weaknesses but at the Saviour 
that you have. Well, then, why don't men come to Christ ? Well, 
I hope tonight with the help of God to answer a few fool excuses 
people offer. I don't know whether God himself could answer 
them all or would try to, but I will try to answer a few of them. 

"In the first place, because of sin. Sin has kept multitudes 
away from Jesus Christ. They know that they need Jesus Christ 
but they know that if they came down here and accepted Him they 
would have to give up sin and change their way of living and you 
won't pay the price; then you will never be saved. You must 
turn from every known sin. Moody preached one night and pic- 
tured sin in all its black repulsiveness and when he gave the in- 
vitation a man lifted his hand and a worker went and talked with 
him and said : 'Will you give Mr. Moody your hand ?' 'No, sir ; 
if Moody had known my life he could not have pictured it more 
graphically than he has done tonight.' 'Well, certainly, you are 
not proud of it, are you?' 'No, I am not proud of it, sir.' 'Then 
you will give up your life of sin?' 'No, I won't. I am held in 
the meshes of an awful sin and as the result of indulgence in it 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 159 

I make money out of it, and to take Mr. Moody's hand means 
that I would have to give that up, and I won't do it.' And he 
turned his back on Jesus. Sin is keeping many a man from 
Christ. You know" that you would have to cut out the whisky, 
or regulate your life and your way of living. There are lots of 
things that you would have to do. 

"With others it is the love of money. Many know that if they 
become Christians that they would lose money by the deal, and 
there are certain things in your business that you would have to 
give up if you became a Christian and took your stand for Jesus 
Christ. And many a man will not sacrifice the crooked price of 
a crooked business or the crooked price of an honest business. 
There is many a man chooses a larger income and turns Jesus 
Christ down. Many a man would have to give up his situation. 

"I was preaching one night in Farwell hall and said to a man, 
'Give your heart to Christ.' He said : Tf I do that, it will mean 
the loss of my position. I draw a salary of $3,700 a year, and all 
my expenses traveling on the road.' 'What do you do?' T travel 
for a wholesale liquor house of Louisville, and if I go down and 
take you by the hand, I would have to telegraph my resignation 
to the house tomorrow, and I could not do it, for I have raised 
my wife and children to live commensurate with my salary.' 
'How long do you expect to live? Suppose that you live five 
years, that would be $15,000; then you will sell your soul to the 
Devil for $15,000. Suppose that you get $1,000 a year and live 
twenty years, that would be $20,000, and you would sell your soul 
to the Devil for $20,000? If I should tell you that you are not 
worth that, you would be offended ; yet you sell your soul for less 
than that/ 

"That it what is the matter with the whisky business. I know 
of men that have taken their stand for Jesus Christ in this town, 
and the whisky gang, those miserable, good-for-nothing, low- 
down scoundrels, have said that they won't buy a dollar's worth 
from them. By the Eternal God, I am going to slap something 
on before I leave here. If I don't make some of those cussed old 
bull-necked degenerates in this town sizzle, you don't know me. 
I will tell you, I had rather walk to heaven over a rough and 



160 Life and Labors of 

stony road with bare and bleeding feet, than ride to hell on dirty 
money. 

"I said to two girls one night in West Pullman: 'Why don't 
you give your hearts to Christ?' And they said, 'Mr. Sunday, 
we clerk in a department store and on special days we are com- 
pelled to stand behind the counter, and misrepresent goods, and 
we cannot do that and be Christians.' 

"Say, God will damn in the hottest hell any merchant that will 
make his clerks lie to sell a few dirty goods from his shelves in 
order to put money in his till. He will damn you, whoever you 
are. There is many a man grows rich by overreaching his neigh- 
bor. He robs the widow and the orphan. He does it by legal 
means. He is too slick to get caught in the meshes of the lav/, 
and he lives in a magnificent home, and he rolls down the street 
in a faultless equipage, and some old fellow with a child stands 
on the street corner, and says : 'There goes Mr. So and So. And 
his name is known and honored and it is only necessary to attach 
his name to any project to insure success. I wish you to do 
nothing more than to grow up to emulate his example.' 

"By and by he dies, and there is an uproar and a fuss and a 
powwow over his old carcass at the funeral, and they pass resolu- 
tions as long as from here to the back door, and send a copy to 
his wife and the members of his club, and the lodges, and all the 
other things he was a member of, stating 'whereases,' and 'we 
resolves/ while the bones of his victims lie rotting yonder in the 
potters' field. 

"Tell me that there is no hell for a scoundrel like that? Man 
will live with no thought about God in business, home, society, 
or the company that he keeps. I had rather undertake to save 
ten drunkards than one old money shark; it would be easier. A 
friend of mine went back to his home town in Ohio, and there 
was a rich man there that was very ill. And he went to relieve 
those that were watching by his bedside, and he sat talking with 
him one night, and the death dew was on his brow, and the death 
rattle in his throat. It was 2 o'clock in the morning and the sick 
man rolled over and said: 'Say, do you know a place where I can 
invest my money at six per cent first mortgage? I am only 
getting three with my money in the bank/ 



t 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 161 

"There was that old sinner, only four hours from the hearse, 
and instead of getting ready to meet God he was wondering 
where he could get six per cent for his money. 

"Some man says, 'You give me present possession — I don't care 
anything about future hope.' Supposing tonight that you were 
worth a million dollars and had a beautiful home, and were sur- 
rounded with a retinue of servants but knew that tomorrow 
morning when the sun rose, and the banks opened, and the court 
convened, that you would be proved to be a defaulter, and an 
embezzler, and spend the rest of your days in the penitentiary? 
Or suppose that tonight you are a hobo, and a weary Willie, and 
have not clothes enough to flag an ice wagon, and haven't the 
price of a sinker, and have to crawl into a hog lot, or straw stack 
to sleep; but you knew that tomorrow morning when the sun 
would rise and the banks open and the courts convene that you 
would be proved to be heir to a million dollars. Would you rather 
have present possession, and hell at the end, or the other way? 

"You would say, 'Give me future hope ; never mind about pres- 
ent possessions.' All the wealth of the world cannot give you 
assurance of life. You don't know but that you are listening to 
your funeral sermon tonight. 

"Come with me to New York, and let me turn into the brown 
stone mansion of Vanderbilt and ring the door bell, and the 
liveried servant will come, and we walk along the hall and turn 
into a library, and there at a flat top desk sat two men talking 
about the investment of a hundred million dollars. One was 
Vanderbilt, and the other was Garrett, the vice president of the 
13. & O. They were just talking about the investment of $no,- 
000,000, when Vanderbilt fell dead. All that he had, could not 
give him the assurance of sitting there and finishing that busi- 
ness transaction. The world can give you no hope. 

"The love of money is keeping many a man away from Jesus. 
I don't believe that any man ever lost out by being decent. If I 
was in business and could not serve God in it, I would get out 
of it. Nobody ever lost by being a man ; nobody on God's dirt. 

"Again somebody says, T would but I want to have a good 
time.' Well, so do I. God bless your heart, you never looked into 



162 - Life and Labors of 

anybody's face that had a better time than I do. But I don't have 
to fill myself with booze and go down the street whooping like a 
Comanche Indian, or a maniac. What do you think constitutes a 
good time? Is it to crawl into the arms of some prostitute, and 
cussing and damning and swearing? God pity you if that is 
what you call having a good time. I see some old men and 
] women here. Probably you think that after a while when you 
get tired of this old world, you will turn to Jesus. The longer 
you live, the less you get out of indulgence, and the tighter the 
grip of the world. Many a young man knows that if he does that 
he will have to give up certain things. 

"Many girls know that they will have to turn from some things. 
Like the young girl that came to Dr. John Hall and said: ''I 
want to join the church.' He said: 'It is one thing to join the 
church, but of course you will have to agree to certain things.' 
'What do you mean ; if you mean that in order to be a Christian 
that I have got to give up dancing, I will not do it.' 'You will 
if God wants you to.' And she said: 'Doctor Hall, if it comes 
to choosing between Jesus Christ and the dance I have no hesi- 
tancy in telling you that I will choose the dance.' And the poor 
fool made the choice and went out into the world. 

"All right, if that is all the value that you put on your soul, 
God pity your infinitesimal, mediocre make-up. You say: 'Look 
here ; is there nothing to give up if a man becomes a Christian ?' 
Yes ; the farmer that gets a crop gives up sweat of his brow ; the 
coal miner must sweat for others ; the fellow that gets an educa- 
tion gives up something — everything that you get you have to 
do that. I was in a town in Missouri and a young fellow came 
and got on his knees and sighed and groaned, but didn't seem 
to get any light. And pretty soon he pulled a pack of cards out 
of his pocket and said : 'Now I can pray — I knew all along what 
was the matter with me/ And in Iowa a young fellow was 
praying and could not get any light, and finally he threw down 
some loaded dice and said: 'Now I can pray. I have been skin- 
ning people and I have been fighting as to whether I could give 
up.' Another fellow put his hand down in his jeans and pulled 
out a big plug of Climax tobacco, with the northwest corner bit 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 163 

off of it, and threw it at my feet and said: 'Now I can pray.' 
Another fellow came forward and struggled and didn't get any 
light, and pretty soon he ran his hand down in the pocket of his 
pantaloons and pulled out a pint flask of Guggenheimer's Rye, 
and said : 'Now I can pray. I have been putting whisky between 
me and God/ Some little fool-thing you have between you and 
God, and will you put it beneath your feet and be a man, or go 
through the world and be a fool ? 

"Somebody says : 'I am waiting to be convinced before I ac- 
cept Jesus Christ. Just as soon as I am convinced that Jesus 
Christ is the son of God and just as soon as I am convinced that 
the Bible is the word of God I am going to take my stand.' 

"Listen ; I am going to make you this offer to any honest skep- 
tic in the audience. If you accept the proposition you are honest. 
If you don't accept it, you are an old wind-bag, and an old mar- 
plot and poltroon. You say you don't believe there is a God, 
possibly there is a God. Well, don't you think he could reveal 
himself to you? 'I don't know about that; possibly God could 
reveal himself to me, I doubt whether he could or not.' 'Are 
you willing to take your stand on the possibility that there is a 
God and follow it no matter where it leads you ?' 

" 'Well, I never had it put to me in that way before/ Act as 
though there is a God. If you want to know, the Bible says that 
these things were written that you might believe that Jesus is the 
Christ and believe in Him that you may have life through His 
name. Now, if you are an officer of the law and you are trying 
to find a prisoner and somebody gives you a clue you would run 
down that clue to find out if there is anything in it, to find out 
if it will lead you to the criminal. And you are a scientist and 
are trying to make a discovery or are trying to invent something 
and somebody gives you a clue, you would follow that clue and 
see whether it would throw any light on the subject. 

"Then if you are honest in saying that you are seeking a light 
and somebody will give you information to that end, gives you 
a clue, tells you what to do, then if you are honest you will do it, 
and if you don't do it you are not honest. Pray to God and He 
will answer it. 



164 Life and Labors of 

" 'Oh,' says a fellow, 'I don't know about that.' But I know it 
and I have proved it in these twenty years that I have been a 
Christian. I have proved it since I have been in Decatur. The 
first night I walked on this platform I looked the tabernacle over, 
and I prayed to God that some night there would be enough 
people come forward to go back to post four and three and God 
pushed them back to four and three that night. I prayed that 
the first night that I walked on this platform and it took nearly 
three hundred people to do it and God waited until the meetings 
were nearly closed to bring enough people down to push it back 
to four and three, but he did it. I just as firmly believe that God 
did that as I do that I am standing here tonight. 

"A friend of mine going home one evening said he passed a 
man strolling out on his front lawn. It was a beautiful June 
afternoon just after a June shower; you know what kind of a 
day that must have been. He was strolling along with his hands 
behind his back and my friend says: 'Isn't this a beautiful day? 
How good God is for giving us the sunshine and the rain ?' The 
man said to my friend: 'I would give all I have got if I could 
only believe as you. I am an old man 76 years old and I am 
worth $100,000 and I haven't a chick or a child to leave it to, 
and I would be willing to give all that I have got if I could only 
believe as you do.' My friend said : 'Are you willing to believe 
as I do ?' 

"He said: 'Yes, if I could.' 'Then come with me/ They 
went into the house of my friend, asked the man's wife for a 
pencil and paper and sat down and wrote something like this: 
T believe there is an eternal difference between right and wrong 
and I hereby take my stand on the side of right and promise to 
follow it no matter where it leads me; no matter if it leads me 
over Niagara falls, and if God reveals himself to me I promise 
to accept him as my Saviour and keep and serve him the best I 
know how until I die.' 

"He read it over to him, and then handed it to him to read. 
After he had read he said: 'That is a fair and square statement 
of my position. You said you would give all you have got to 
believe the way I believe ; then sign that and it won't cost you a 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 165 

cent/ 'Well, leave it here and let me think it over.' 'You told 
me that you would give all that you have got if you could only 
believe as I believe and now God is giving you a chance.' He 
said a man ought to have time to think that over. 'You ought 
to have thought it over for seventy-six years.' 'Let me wait until 
tomorrow, and I will think it over a little longer. I will let you 
know tomorrow.' 

"He didn't sign it then and he never did. God produced the 
test for that man and he failed and there are multitudes of people 
here tonight who are in the same boat. You are here tonight 
who are waiting to be convinced, yet you won't do a thing that 
God demands you to do in order that God might convince you. 
You come here and sit every night like a hitching post, and you 
say you are looking for light, yet you will go out and look up 
proof and evidence that there is no light. You say you are look- 
ing for light and yet you won't do a thing that God wants you 
to do to lead you into the light. If you want to know, God Al- 
mighty will flood you with evidence. 

"A man says, 'See here, Mr. Sunday, I am a pretty good sort 
of a fellow and if I do right, I don't need to profess Christianity.' 
The rich young ruler came to Jesus Christ and went away. He 
wasn't a grafter and he wasn't a thief, but he went from Jesus 
Christ. He wasn't a Sabbath breaker but he went away from 
Jesus Christ. He wasn't a scoffer or a railer at God but he went 
away from Jesus Christ. That is just what you are doing; going 
away from Jesus. You are not a thief nor a libertine nor a 
grafter, no and you are not a dishonest man or woman, but you 
are rejecting Jesus Christ by going away from Him, and He 
can't save you. 

"Supposing there is a man in Decatur who is a good husband 
who is kind to his wife and children, generous to his fellow men 
and to his lodge and willing to help a person who is in trouble 
and distress, is virtuous and good and whose name is synony- 
mous with all that is good and pure, but he treats with contempt 
his old mother. He would drive her from his presence ; he would 
make his neighbors furnish food for her to eat and clothes for 
her to wear and make them furnish a bed in which to sleep. 



1 66 Life and Labors of 

Would the fact that he is good to his wife and children and is 
generous to his lodge and fellow men, would that atone for the 
fact that he treats his old mother like a fool ? 

"Listen; you would say that a man who was so low down and 
good for nothing as that, is a low-down citizen, yet every man 
who treats his mother like that is not so low down as the man 
who slaps Jesus Christ in the face. 

"Jesus Christ is better than his mother, better than his wife, 
and better than his neighbors and his children. There are lots 
of men who are good to their wife and mother and generous to 
their lodge and kind to their fellow men and who are virtuous 
and pure but who treat Jesus like a brute. Some of you treat 
Him worse than you would a hog in a lot. Some of you treat 
Him worse than a horse in the stall and a cow. Don't talk 
about being a good man when you turn your back on Jesus Christ. 

"You ought to be different. A fellow says, 'Well I am a pretty 
good sort of a fellow/ but will that stand the test in your dying 
hour? Will that stand the test of the Judgment when you stand 
before God? Not much. Don't talk to me about that. Another 
fellow on account of the hypocrites in the church will not come 
forward. You shut your mouth. If that is the only excuse that 
you have got. Certainly, certainly there are hypocrites in the 
church, but I don't believe that the hypocrites in the church are 
keeping any man or woman out of the church that wants to do 
right. I think he is using the hypocrites as a screen behind which 
he can hide. If you hide behind a hypocrite you are the smallest 
specimen of humanity I have ever looked on in my life. Some 
bugologist would do science a great thing if he would take you 
and pickle you in alcohol and keep you on public exhibition as 
a specimen of a little thing. 

"You won't give your heart to God, and say you won't come 
into the church because of the hypocrites when you are going to 
hell and will have to associate with the same people that you 
turn up your nose to on earth. All hypocrites will go to hell. 
There won't be any hypocrites in heaven. 'Follow thou me/ 
Never mind the hypocrites in the church. If there were one 
hundred Christians and ninety-nine of them were good, honest 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 167 

men and one little low-down hypocrite, you would get your eye 
fastened on the hypocrite and turn your back on the ninety-nine 
Christians. 

"If the Devil wanted to show you the best handiwork that he 
could do he would get the best man or woman morally who is not 
a Christian, but if he wanted to show you some of the special 
handiwork of religion he would get the most miserable and good- 
for-nothing little hypocrite and say : That is a specimen of Chris- 
tianity.' There is absolutely no excuse to say that you won't be a 
Christian because of the hypocrites in the Church. I am not go- 
ing to refuse to be loyal to the United States because some people 
break its laws. I am not going to refuse to be loyal to Illinois 
because a few people are not. I am not going to slap God in the 
face because I see somebody slap Him. I am not going to hell 
because a hypocrite goes. If he wants to go there he can go. 
It will keep you busy keeping yourself out of hell; never mind 
about the hypocrites. 

"Somebody says: 'The trouble with me is I am waiting for 
some of my friends to go forward with me. I am waiting for my 
wife or my husband.' Or some young man says : T am waiting 
for some of my companions.' I think probably there is little 
semblance of reason to that talk. You are waiting for another. 
You take your stand for Jesus and if they think enough of you, 
they will follow you and if they don't you let them alone. Take 
your stand for Jesus Christ and do what the Lord wants you to 
do and put it up to them to go to hell. 

"If this building was afire, you would not sit there and say: 
'Are you going to go out?' You would get out just as quick as 
you could. It wouldn't make any difference what the others did ; 
you know what you would do. So you want to get out from 
under the wrath of God just as quick as you can; don't wait for 
somebody else. 

"A friend of mine was preaching in a town one time and he 
asked those in the building who wanted to be Christians to raise 
their hands. There was a man and wife there; he was super- 
intendent of schools and his wife was principal and she lifted 
her hand. When they went home they talked about it. She 



168 Life and Labors of 

said : 'Husband, I am convinced I ought to go to church.' He 
said : 'Look here, wife, we have lived together fourteen years and 
nothing has come between us before. You don't need to do it. 
Every one in town respects us. We go to the best homes in town 
and are in the best society, and there is no use to do it. We can 
go around to all the churches and show that we love them all/ 

"I say : 'I think I like all the women ; I love one. I picked her 
out and married her twenty years ago. I like all the churches, 
I picked one out and went into it. You have never seen a suc- 
cessful, happy Christian who would stay out of church, never 
in your life. If God Almighty hadn't known the church was the 
best he wouldn't have established it. God almighty knew that 
the church was the best or he would not have started it. Don't 
be a fool. 

"She said : 'Husband, I am going to take my stand for Christ,' 
and she did. Later on she was convinced that she ought to join 
the church if she wanted to be a good Christian. She said to her 
husband: 'I am going to join the church.' He said: 'Look here, 
for fourteen and a half years, nothing has come between us. If 
you join the church, you go your way and I go mine.' I have 
been told that there is a man in this town that said to his children, 
if they went down here and took a stand he would lick them 
down the aisles. By the grace of God, if you would do it, I 
would get down off of this platform and lick you, if it was the 
last thing that I ever did; you just try it. You just keep your 
old hands off, or God Almighty will put you in your coffin. You 
can say how much the rent is, and you can say how much your 
childrens' clothes will cost ; but when you come to the matter of 
religion and the matter of accepting Jesus Christ, I tell you if 
you are here tonight, I tell you to your dirty face, that that is 
something beyond you, and something you have got nothing to 
say about. When you stand between your children and God, and 
when you stand between your wife and God, I tell you you had 
better get out of the way or God will put you in your coffin. 

"He said to his wife : 'You go your way and I will go mine/ 
She said: 'Husband, I am ashamed of you. I am ashamed of 
you, I never expected such a thing from you. I never supposed 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 169 

that the name that I bear and the image that is woven in the 
fabric of my heart would tell me that. I am disappointed in you. 
I want to please God rather than man, and if, in order to please 
God I must displease you I will turn my back on you; it must 
be that way, if I am going to serve God/ She rushed to her 
room and her husband went to his room and walked the floor and 
cursed and raved. The clock struck ten, eleven, twelve, one, two, 
and he fought it out. At last he walked to her door and rapped. 
She said, 'come in/ He stepped to her side and said: 'Wife. 
we have walked side by side for fourteen years and a half and 
nothing has ever come between us and nothing shall ever come 
between us. I will accept your Christ and we will go in the 
church together/ And the next Sunday morning they walked 
down the aisle arm in arm. 

"Don't wait for anybody. Do what God wants you to and 
never mind about anybody else. Somebody says : 'I would, Mr. 
Sunday, but I don't feel like it/ You know where in the Bible 
God tells you that you must believe. Feeling is the result of 
belief. To be saved you must believe. Christianity is the obedi- 
ence to the commands of God. God requires you to believe to 
be saved. Christianity isn't the product of emotion, it is the 
obedience of the commandments of God. I have seen some peo- 
ple who are cold as rock until they walk down and take their 
stand for Jesus Christ, then tears came. 

"I know a man who got up and said, 'Mr. Sunday, do you 
think there is any hope for a man who hasn't shed a tear in twenty 
years?' He thought to be a Christian meant to cry. 'Do you 
think there is any hope for a man who hasn't shed a tear in twenty 
years?' As he said it the tears trickled down his cheeks. He 
started out and the tears came where they had never come before. 
Feeling comes as a result of belief. God requires belief, to be 
saved. I have heard people say, 'I am so happy. I believe in the 
Lord and I feel happy.' I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and I 
am happy in doing right and keeping his commandments. Sup- 
pose I go into your home and you are ill. I say, 'Hello, what is 
the matter?' 

"You say, 'I have got lumbago.' That so? I had that once/ 



170 Life and Labors of 

'Did you? What did you take ?' 1 took a patent medicine.' 'Cure 
you?' 'Yes, for once. I am well.' 'What does it cost?' 'One 
dollar?' 'Remember the name ?' 'Yes.' 'Will you write it down?' 
'Yes.' 'All right, write it down. Come here, son, you take this 
dollar and go down to the drug store and get a bottle of this 
medicine.' 

"The boy goes down and gets the medicine and brings it back 
and hands it to you. You take it and say, 'Is that the medicine 
you took?' 'No; I took some just like it though.' 'And it cured 
you?' 'Yes.' I go out and in a week or so I go back and say, 
'How do you feel?' 'Worse.' 'Take any of that medicine?' 'No.' 
'Why not?' 'I didn't feel any better after it came in and I didn't 
take any.' 

"You don't feel the effects of medicine until after you take it. 
No, you don't feel like a Christian until you have become a Chris- 
tian. I go in to the dining room and see the table set with food 
ready to eat ; I can't feel the satisfaction until after I have eaten 
the food. That is the way with religion. 

"If I have got to have my leg cut off I don't feel the pain until 
the doctor puts the knife in. I feel happier after I have become 
a Christian. You feel happy as a result of having believed. 
Don't let that keep you away from Jesus Christ. He will save 
you from the power of the Devil. Isn't that a grand thing? 

"You ought to take your stand for salvation, for influence. 
Finney was preaching down in Rochester, he stood there one 
night and up in the gallery on the front seat sat the chief justice 
of the court of appeals. Finney was trained to be a lawyer and 
Finney preached the gospel from an argumentative standpoint. 
As he preached the chief justice leaned over the railing and said 
to a friend : 'If that man was pleading a case before me and he 
could present it in such great clearness and logic as that I would 
take the case away from the jury and give him a decision. His 
arguments are reasonable.' 

"He leaned forward and listened. Presently he said to his 
friend: T claim to be honest, and I claim no honest man can 
listen to that man and not accept what he preaches ; his arguments 
are unanswerable. Absolutely unanswerable.' He listened to 



Rev. Wm. A, (Billy) Sunday 171 

him a little longer and presently he grabbed his coat and hat and 
walked downstairs and up on the platform. He reached up and 
pulled Finney's coat tail and said: 'When you call for sinners 
to come to the front I will be the first to lead out/ The chief 
justice of the court of appeals said to Finney that if he would 
ask for penitents to come to the front he would be the first to 
lead the way. Finney closed his sermon and made that known 
and when he called for the penitents to come forward the chief 
justice was the first to take his hand and before the meeting closed 
nearly every barrister in Rochester had accepted Jesus Christ. 
And in twelve months thousands were converted. For the sake 
of influence. 

"I traveled with Mr. Chapman for two years. We were hold- 
ing union meetings at Indianapolis and one night, President Har- 
rison with his daughter, Mrs. McKee, on his arm, came into the 
hall where we were holding the meetings. The chief usher came 
up to me and said : 'President Harrison and his daughter are here 
tonight/ I turned to Doctor Chapman and told him. Doctor Chap- 
man asked the pastor of the First Presbyterian church, of which 
the president was a member, to invite the president to sit on the 
platform. He said: T know the president is greatly interested 
in religion and everybody knows his magnificent character, and 
he would not shrink from anything that would help people to ac- 
cept Jesus Christ ; but he is in politics and some people would be 
low down enough to say that the president came up there for 
the political prestige that he would gain/ The doctor's feelings 
were hurt, and he turned to me and said: 'Mr. Sunday, will you 
go?' I said, 'Yes/ I walked down the aisle to the president's 
seat and introduced myself. I said: 'Mr. President, my name is 
Mr. Sunday, and I am Doctor Chapman's assistant and I come as 
his ambassador to invite you to sit on the platform.' He rose in 
all his Chesterfieldian politeness and dignity, and thanked me for 
the invitation to sit on the platform, but said he would prefer to 
sit there with his daughter and enjoy the meetings. 

"I said: 'You are the president of the United States, and if 
you would sit on the platform it would have a tremendous influ- 
ence in the cause of Christianity, and it might induce many to take 



iJ2 Life and Labors of 

a stand for Jesus Christ who otherwise would not.' His daughter 
looked up and said : 'You go and I will sit here and wait for you.' 
He turned to me and said: 'Mr. Sunday, if you think that my 
presence on that platform will in any way save souls and induce 
people to accept Jesus Christ as their Saviour, I will be glad to go.' 

"And the proudest moment of my life was when I walked down 
the aisle in Tomlinson hall with President Harrison on my arm. 
We walked up the steps and that vast audience swayed to their 
feet in a paroxysm of cheers and they sang, 'My Country, Tis 
of Thee, Sweet Land of Liberty, of Thee I Sing.' 

"How do you feel, you little whisky-soaked seven-dollar-a-week 
shrimp? You turn up your nose at Religion as being beneath 
you. You are too proud to be a Christian. It would lower your 
manhood. It elevates President Roosevelt, it elevates William J. 
Bryan It elevates their manhood but it lowers your manhood. 
You are a fool. 'And ye will not come to me, that ye might have 
life.' Will you do it while we pray ?" 



For we are not ignorant of his devices. — 
II Cor. 2:11. 

"Man in general thinks very little about the Devil and his de- 
vices and he is the most formidable enemy the human race has 
to contend with. You let some malignant disease go around and 
you will do everything that you can in order to prevent its getting 
into your house. When Chicago had the diphtheria and scarlet 
fever cases I took care of my children. I used to have them gar- 
gle Listerine and have them wash with a solution of Carbonate 
of Mercury. I bought Waukesha water to drink. Helen was go- 
ing to high school, and one day she would sit by the side of some 
girl and the next day that girl would be in bed with diphtheria ; 
and George would be sitting with some boy and the next day that 
boy would be down with scarlet fever. Now, when the Lord tells 
you that the Devil is the cause of all the sorrow and misery that 
comes to this world, we ought to be more diligent. 

"I believe the devices of the Devil are in number like the sands 
of the sea. They are so great that you are not able to number 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 173 

them. The devices of the Devil are peculiarly adapted to you as 
the ward of the lock to the key that fits it. He is able to adapt 
them to various temperaments. What would be a temptation to 
me, you would turn down. 

"The Devil knows your weakness and he will adapt a tempta- 
tion peculiar to you and your condition. He is able to modify it 
so it will have a greater impression over you. If he comes to 
you with something that is at first repulsive he will modify it and 
take away the harsh things. We speak of Satan as one, but there 
are millions. The devils are fallen angels. They fell from their 
first estate of innocency and rebelled against God. Each individual 
angel was created. You and I are the offspring of Adam and 
Eve When Jesus was born He took our nature and died for the 
sins of the human life and not of the angels. There are distinct 
orders, principalities and powers under the Devil. 

"They work for the Devil the same as I work for Jesus and 
they will break their necks in order to advance the cause of the 
Devil's gang. The Devil works through individuals. God wants 
to get the Devil out of you and then send you out to fight the 
Devil. When you oppose Jesus you will fight for the Devil and 
you are a devil, and the Devil is in you and he is using your body 
and you are fool enough to play into his hands. 

"He adapts his temptation to the temperament of individuals 
and all occasions. The Devil is doing some things now that he 
never thought of and will do after this meeting is over. The 
whisky gang is still now because Bill's here. Wait until Bill goes 
and then see what they will do. That gang is afraid of me. They 
are the most contemptible mob this side of perdition, that whisky 
gang. 

"The Devil is able to transform himself into the image of light 
and the suggestions of the Devil seem to carry the character of 
heaven instead of hell. The Devil is a smart guy. The Devil is 
onto his job. You would think the Devil wouldn't have any zeal 
for God's honor and you would think the Devil too low down to 
make use of the perfections of God. The Devil will get a whole lot 
of people to get their names on the church record. You wouldn't 
think that the Devil could make use of the pulpit to advance his 



1/4 Life and Labors of 

interest, the pew and the choir loft. Whoopee! Why God bless 
your heart, half the church scraps start in the choir lofts. He 
don't miss anything. The Devil said to Adam and Eve : 'Ye shall 
not surely die.' He acted as if he wanted to put Eve next. Eve 
was too good to die. So he lulls conscience to sleep. 

"God is too merciful to kill his creatures for sin, so we have 
Universalism. They won't be saved, because they won't repent 
and turn from their sin. The Devil is in Christian Science bigger 
than a woodchuck. It appears in his choice of instruments. 
When he wanted to seduce Adam he took Eve as his instrument. 
You take a woman with the Devil in her and she is the limit and 
then some. [A man said 'amen.'] I tell you a man with the 
Devil in him is running her a close second. [Applause.] I don't 
know of any power that could lift this old world closer to the 
heart of God than a woman with the heart of God in her. Job 
was tried by a device of the Devil. He was a man of a hundred 
karats, not your three karats. The Devil made a proposition to 
God that if He touched Job in his health or belongings he would 
curse Him to His face, so He sent a wind that killed his children ; 
his flocks and herds were stolen from him and sent boils to add 
to his misery. Then Mrs. Job came along and said :'Why don't 
you curse God and die?' I have often wondered why God didn't 
kill the old woman. He wanted to but didn't have any use for 
her. I tell you the Devil is smooth in his choice of instruments. 

"There are two forces working right now in Decatur, the Devil 
and God. That man is a fool that plays into the hands of the 
Devil. The Devil tried to divert Jesus from His life's work by 
entering into Peter and Judas. Peter cussed and swore; Judas 
betrayed Him; Thomas said: T am from Missouri, you have got 
to show me ;' James and John got to scrapping to see who would 
be the greatest in the kingdom, and they had a whole lot of 
trouble. 

"Who can estimate his power? What effect the Devil would 
have on this world if there was no power to restrain him ! The 
church is the instrument through which God is working to over- 
throw the work of the Devil, so it's up to you to decide to throw 
your influence for Jesus Christ and the church and stop working 
for the Devil. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 1 75 

"Every man has some weak spot and as individuals we have 
got to be on the watch, because the Devil knows what that weak 
spot is and keeps pounding away at that. David was a wonderful- 
ly successful man, but he had weak spots in his makeup. He sent 
the census takers out and God was displeased and gave him his 
choice of three kinds of punishment ; seven years of famine, three 
months of fleeing from his enemies, or three days of pestilence. 
David choose the three days of pestilence and 85,000 of his king- 
dom died. 

"Abraham took his wife Sarah into Egypt. The old king said : 
'I want her for my harem/ Abraham told a lie and said she was 
his sister. I don't half blame him, do you? It was half the truth 
and a half lie, because she was his half sister. I think I would 
lie to save my wife from some old geezer like that. I don't know 
what I would do, but that was Abraham's weakness. Peter was a 
trimmer. He vacillated. He would take a little cruise and tack 
and then come back again. He represented the circumcised, and 
Paul plead for the right of the uncircumcised, and had to with- 
stand Peter to his face. They were both full of zeal and had 
trouble all along. The Devil knew Peter's besetting sin. 

"It is natural for some people to be joyful and others to be 
gloomy. The Devil knows our weakness. Talmage tells of a 
woman who wore blue goggles and consequently everything 
looked blue to her. Moody told of a carpenter that no matter 
what happened, he always found something to praise God for. 
After a strike lasting six months he went back to work and met 
with an accident which nearly severed his thumb. They won- 
dered what he would say, and at the first meeting he could get to 
after the accident he said: 'Bless God, I didn't cut her clear off.' 

"Not only individually, but collectively you have to be on your 
guard. You will have to watch when these meetings are over, for 
the Devil will be very busy then. For God's sake don't go to fight- 
ing among yourselves. After a meeting in Iowa in a town of 
about 900 or 1,000 there was a Methodist pastor who was a crank 
on second blessing, and a Baptist who was a crank on close 
communion and baptism, and they met on the street one day and 
indulged in a free for all fight. I need not say more because I 



176 Life and Labors of 

believe you will preserve the magnificent spirit of unity in Deca- 
tur. When the Devil gets to work after a revival he likes to stir 
things up. You will remember we wrestle not against flesh and 
blood. Keep your eye on God for when the Devil gets you down 
you will have a hard job to rise. No wonder the Christians lose 
their faith and begin to wobble when he gets in his work. When 
some of us pray we start in Decatur, touch every prominent coun- 
try in the world and get back into the meeting in time to kill it. 
When you pray hit the bull's eye, ring the bell and sit down. You 
will never do anything by compromising, by following, like Peter, 
afar off. Some people say : 'Don't get too close to religion. Don't 
be too religious/ You want to strike a happy medium, which is 
afar off. Peter tried that and lost out. He got into bad com- 
pany. He chose the wrong bunch, and his speech betrayed him. 
Jesus is more than a match for the Devil, and if you turn Him 
down your case is hopeless." 



He lifted up his eyes in hell, being in tor- 
ment.— Luke 16 :23. 

"Says someone, 'Why, that is figurative.' W T ell, we will let it 
go at that ; we will see later on whether it is. Anything is better 
than going to hell. If I was going to choose my subject to preach 
this afternoon I would not have chosen this, but a man 
can not be a faithful minister of God and pass by all the doctrines 
in the Bible simply because they are distasteful to some people. 
It is an awful subject when one stops to think that man's rebellion 
makes necessary a place of punishment and God has done all he 
can to open up a plan whereby man can escape hell. I wish per- 
sonally that I could believe there is no hell, but I cannot. I wish 
everybody in the universe would repent and accept Jesus Christ. 
Yet I know they won't do it, although I work hard. 

"And if men will reject Jesus it is proper that hell should exist, 
for there must be a place where man is confined. If we will 
choose unbelief instead of faith in Jesus, it is for the good of the 
universe, and the glory of God that there should be such a place. 
If it was not for jails your life would not be safe and I want to 



Rev. Win. A. (Billy) Sunday 177 

tell you that the fear of prison bars holds many a man back from 
committing a crime. If you live a virtuous life you would not 
expect to have the same fate as the one that damns God. 

"Hell is just as much a manifestation of God's love as heaven. 
I can picture the love of God by preaching about hell. Because 
I can show what the love of God was made manifest to save you 
from, and you must see what God's love keeps you out of if you 
will accept Jesus Christ. I wish everybody would repent and 
make hell unnecessary as far as the human race goes. I don't 
know whether the angels that rebelled ever will repent or not. 

"I do not want to preach a lie. I had rather preach an un- 
pleasant truth than a pleasant lie. I am well aware of the fact 
that if a man stands square on the word of God some people will 
sneer at him and mock and rail and ridicule and call him puritan- 
ical, but I want to tell you I have no desire to appear any different 
from what Jesus Christ did, and when he says a thing I have a 
desire to tell what he says and I don't want to be any more broad 
than Jesus was broad. The best friend that you have is the man 
that tells you the truth. When a man sounds a warning of hell 
you sneer and mock and say he is trying to frighten people. He 
is only trying to tell the truth. 

"Some preachers say: 'Let us eat, drink and be merry, for we 
will all be saved anyway.' If I believed everybody would be 
saved, I would quit preaching. What is the use of my standing 
here cutting my throat to pieces to save people from hell, if there 
is no hell to save them from? If there is no hell, the preachers 
are the greatest frauds on earth, for we take money under false 
pretenses. If everybody is going to be saved, let them go ahead 
and live as they please. 

"I am not going to give my speculations or theories or opinions. 
They are not worth any more than any other fool's opinions. And 
a man who preaches his opinions and theories is a fool, but the 
one that preaches the word of God is the one that has sense. I 
think God knows more about it than any old theologian that I 
ever butted into. God's revelation is worth 400,000,000 train 
loads of some men's opinions. When God says one thing and 
you have an opposite opinion, am I going to follow your opinion 
12 



178 Life and Labors of 

and slap God in the face? No; I will slap you. I will pin nry 
faith to God rather than to you, you old skeptic. We know there 
is a hell; we are more certain of it than that the sun will rise in 
the morning. 

"A man says we are not sure, because a lot of scholarly minis- 
ters have given up the belief in hell. Why, men like Lyman Ab- 
bott? What do I care about Lyman Abbott. What difference 
does that make? You say some scholarly ministers have given it 
up not because of anything in the word of God, but for some 
sentimental reasons or to get their names in the newspapers. No 
man can go to the Bible to find out what the Bible teaches and 
then stand up and preach against eternal hell. And any man that 
does that is a liar. Listen, I will give you some verses : 'Then shall 
he say to them on his left hand, depart from me ye cursed into 
everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.' 'And to 
you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus shall be 
revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire tak- 
ing vengeance on them that know not God and that obey not the 
gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.' 

"Listen; God knows. The word of God says there is a hell. 
Jesus has declared it and men that God inspired have declared it. 
I am sure there is a hell because God said there is, and I have got 
to rest on what God says. 

"Another thing we all know is that when a man sins he will 
suffer, and will suffer in his body, and the further and longer he 
lives in sin the deeper down he will go in sin. Lots of men are 
living in practical hell and you let a man go on sinning and he 
will sink deeper and deeper until he will reach a point where 
he cannot repent. A man can go on in sin until he can not turn 
from it, and then' what has he left but hell ? We are told in the 
word of God that hell is a place where there is bodily suffering. 
In hell he lifted up his eyes being in torment and said, 'send some 
one with water and moisten my parched lips.' Don't you think 
for one minute if you are unfortunate enough to reject Jesus 
Christ and go to hell that hell will not be a place of physical 
torment, and mind you, conscience will torment you. 

"You listen. The words used in the Bible to describe the doom 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 179 

of the unsaved are death and destruction. Let us see if we can 
find a meaning of those two words. Read Rev. 20:10 and that 
will tell you what God says about it. God says the beasts were 
cast into a lake of fire and brimstone so God's word gives the 
definition of destruction as a lake of fire that burneth. Now let 
us find a definition of death. In Rev. 21 :8, 'But the fearful and 
unbelieving — shall have their part in the lake which burneth with 
fire and brimstone which is the second death.' 

"So God's definition of death and destruction is a place in the 
lake of fire that burneth forever and forever where people are 
conscientiously tormented. You are going to be damned and go 
through torment day and night. Never mind whether it is literal 
fire, like fire in the stove, or not, you can leave that out if you 
want to, but the fact remains that you are going to be tormented. 

"You say it is figurative, but God's figures never lie. We use 
figurative language to describe facts. God told the Jews to go 
into the promised land and said it was a land flowing with milk 
and honey. Nobody believes that. That's figurative. But God 
used words to describe the richness of the land. Now listen. I 
.read, 'He shall cover thee with His feathers.' God is not like a 
great big hen, covering people over with feathers ; but God wants 
to show, like a hen does, I will do with you.' And back of that 
figurative language lies the fact that God will take care of you. 
So God uses figurative language to describe heaven and hell. God 
can talk of gates of pearl to describe heaven, and He can talk 
of a lake of fire to describe hell if He wants to. You use figura- 
tive language every day and back of the figurative language we 
< describe fact, and God uses figurative language to describe hell, 
and you had better keep out of there, too. 

"So when you die you will not be disembodied spirits. Not at 
all. You are going to have a body and your spirit will inhabit 
that body and you are going to be conscious and you will be con- 
. scious in heaven. I am going to meet a lot of you people in 
heaven and we will talk about this revival. We will remember 
in heaven the things of the past and you will remember in hell. 

"Hell is a place of memory and remorse. When you die you 
will not take much to hell with you. You will not take your 



180 Life and Labors of 

] 

clothes anti the things you hang on to in this old world. You ' 
cannot pack up a case of Anheuser Busch and have God ship it 
down there for you. If we could have hell fixed up like club 
rooms with big rocking chairs and an ice chest with Budweiser 
and Decatur Brew on tap, with a colored waiter to serve you, 
you think you could be happy in hell ; but the kind of a hell God 
pictures you cannot be happy in and so you say, 'I don't believe it, 
and that settles it.' Oh, what a fool. In hell you will remember 
all the things you have done in life and I tell you there is no 
torment like an accusing memory. It will be your remorse to 
remember that you had a chance to be saved and that you didn't 
need to have gone to hell had you not chosen to go there instead 
of to heaven. 

"Hell is a place of torment and here on earth you are building 
up desires that you will have no chance to gratify in hell. Have 
you ever been real thirsty? Supposing you would have a desire 
like that of thirst through eternity and had no chance to gratify it. 
In hell there will be no chance to gratify your desires. 

"But in heaven I shall be satisfied when I wake in his likeness. 
'Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered 
into the heart of man to conceive what God hath laid up for 
them that love him/ There will be nothing in heaven we will 
long for and happiness Will reach the very apex of heaven. 

"Hell is going to be a place where the off-scouring and scum 
of the earth are going to be. A lot of you people here on earth 
would not come near this tabernacle or a church. All right; 
wait until you get to hell and see who was the big fool, Bill or 
you. Would you want to live with a lot of people that are here | 
on this earth? No. I will agree there are a lot of people in 
hell that were great on earth. Nero will be there and his mother ; 
Katherine of Russia, Henry VIII, the old libertine. There will 
be lots of people there that were great on this earth — Mill, Spen- 
cer, Huxley, Darwin, Bob Ingersoll, Strauss, Voltaire will be 
there. Yes, men and women that have been great on earth will 
be in hell; but earth's greatness don't amount to the snap of the 
ringer with God. 

"Now I want to say this to you. I have looked the Bible 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 181 

through carefully, and I have never found a word that can give 
a man any hope if he dies without Jesus Christ. A lot of people 
say everlasting does not mean everlasting when it says punish- 
ment, but it means everlasting when it says heaven. But if heaven 
is eternal, hell is eternal, for the same God that said heaven is 
eternal said hell was eternal, and if He lied about hell He lied 
about heaven. So you are up against it. Take your choice, right 
hand or left. 

"Listen; I believe if people would only appreciate the love of 
God as manifest through Christ who dies to save the world, I 
believe the call for the unconverted would cease forever. People 
would rush to God. And there is never a man goes into the 
depths so deep that God cannot reach down and pull him out. 
Therefore, do not go on and test the reality of the lost world, 
but come and have your name written in the Lamb's Book of 
Life. Come ! Come !" 



FEBRUARY 14, 1908. AFTERNOON SERMON 

And when the burnt offering began, the 
song of the Lord began also with the trum- 
pets, and with the instruments ordained by 
David, king of Israel. — II Chron. 29 :27. 

'The difference between the twenty-eighth chapter and the 
twenty-ninth chapter is the difference that we find manifest in the 
church. First the period of great enthusiasm when the people are 
alive and active to labor, and do for God, and then, times of de- 
pression when the pews seem to be as deaf as adders, and the 
pulpit discouraged, and the prayer meeting deserted for the 
haunts of evil, and when the prayer meeting comes the same night 
as a card party you can find more church members at the card 
1 party. We find it in a family that has been noble and grand, and 
then turned round, and turned their backs on God. And we see 
it in the individual. People who have been on the firing line 
for God and truth, and then flown off on a tangent, until they be- 
:ome a curse and a blight in the land. 



182 Life and Labors of 

" 'Ahaz reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem ; but he did not that 
which was right in the sight of the Lord; for he walked in the 
ways of the kings of Israel, and made also molten images for 
Baalim. Moreover he burnt incense in the valley of the son of 
Hinnom, and burnt his children in the fire, after the abomina- 
tions of the heathen whom the Lord had cast out before the chil- 
dren of Israel.' Now for all that the judgment of God fell on 
the people. It is queer how one individual can damn and curse 
a community. The judgment of God fell upon them. 

" 'And Ahaz slept with his fathers and they buried him in the 
city, even in Jerusalem. But they brought him not into the 
sepulchres of the kings of Israel.' 

"He had lived such a disreputable life that when he died they 
would not disgrace the cemetery. I was in a cemetery in Iowa 
with a friend, and we came to a monument fifteen feet high, and 
my friend said, 'That is the monument of the best man in the 
world.' We walked over to a corner to a grave where there 
was a cluster of shrubbery and weeds and I said: 'Whose grave 
is this?' 'That is his son's grave.' 'Why did they bury him 
there?' 'He lived such a godless, disreputable life that they 
would not disgrace his father by putting his bones in the same 
lot' 

" 'Ahaz died, and they buried him in Jerusalem, but brought 
him not into the sepulchres of Israel ' — that is his epitaph. 

"Hezekiah reigned in his stead. He had a good deal against 
him with a bad father. But he had a good mother. That ex- 
plains to me why Hezekiah made a success — Hezekiah was a great 
young fellow because he had a good mother. The most unfortu- 
nate boy on earth is the boy who has for a mother a mere fool 
society woman, who lives for nothing but to be a dress frame on 
which to hang clothes. Every community is cursed with a few 
women like that. If one died and they did not announce it in the 
newspapers no one would miss her. Not even her husband, until 
the millinery became due the first of the month. Hezekiah had 
a good mother. That is the reason that he made a success. 

"Hezekiah came on the scene and found the temple shut up. 
Now the temple cost over $5,000,000, according to the modern 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 183 

standard of money. The temple belonged to the individual deity 
worshiped there ? The same as your farm belongs to you. There- 
fore all the cities had temples. Athens had a temple to Jupiter. 
Corinth one to every god — but the true God — and you can have 
your literaries ; and your schools ; and your colleges ; and every- 
thing on God's dirt, but if you have not temples to Jesus Christ 
your towns will rot into hell. You can blow until you are black 
in the face and all the education in the world will not save De- 
catur. The adornment of the temple was beautiful so it was re- 
garded as the work of angels. Paul says : 'Know ye not that your 
bodies are the temples of the Holy Spirit?' 

"Do you think that God wants to speak through lips that one 
minute praise him and the next hour through lips down which 
they pour wine? Do you think that God wants to nestle in hands 
which one minute grab the Bible and the next grab the forbidden 
fruits of this world? Do you think that God wants to nestle in 
feet that one day walk to church and the next to the grog shop ? 

"You would not think of worshiping in a church which the 
lazy janitor had made the dumping place for last year's ashes, 
and the rats had made a sieve of the carpet. You would not think 
of worshiping in a place like that. Then don't think that God is 
going to dwell in your body when you turn it over to the flesh. 
God has a right to demand that your body be clean. Then go 
home and throw that old plug of tobacco in the fire. Go home 
and throw away that pack of cards, and break up that case of 
beer. This means that Jesus is always with us if we are really 
Christians. And you be careful how you grab Jesus Christ by 
the hand and drag Him into a leg show. 

"For sixteen years there was no song in Israel — no music — 
and this must have been a great loss for the people were accus- 
tomed to sing. For sixteen years no lips had opened to sing the 
songs of God and of God's truth. Why all that? I will tell you. 
Because 'Ahaz had shut up the doors of the porch of the house 
of God and built altars to strange Gods.' In many a life today 
where there is no song you are building altars to strange gods. 
Don't be half for Jesus Christ and half for the merry-go-round 
of fakirs. 



184 Life and Labors of 

"Let me tell you a few things — the outward things that you 
do. I claim that faith claims constant deliverance from the power 
of sin. You have made some reservation. Why is it that there 
are many that are useless in the church? First: The outward 
things. Second: The desires. I claim that Jesus Christ will re- 
move the desire. A man says: T am a booze-fighter'; He will 
take it away. I used to go to theaters every night before I was 
converted. I knew before I was converted it was no place for a 
professing Christian. I can name unprofessing Christians that 
have higher ideals than those in the church. You can't find a 
gambler today that won't tell you that it is wrong to play cards. 

"When the church of God comes up to her ideals, she is going 
to move the world for Jesus Christ. I have just as much right 
to smoke as you have, but you would not walk across the street 
to hear me preach if I did. You would not have much respect 
for my religion, and neither does the world, and neither does the 
Devil ; you even disgust the Devil. The more you love Jesus, and 
trust, the more He will trust you. Some try to justify themselves 
because circumstances are so peculiar. Why don't you have family 
prayers? Because your husband is not a Christian? That don't 
let you out. Your duty is imperative, as the mother of those chil- 
dren. Some people look at Jesus through circumstances and some 
at circumstances through Jesus. 

"You are a member of the church. That don't make any differ- 
ence. That ought to mean that you are a Christian. Half of you 
don't know what Christian experience is. You know what it is 
to join a church and what it is to join a lodge. But as to experi- 
ence — you don't know anything about it. 

"The Holy Spirit can counteract the influence of the world. I 
used to play ball. A pitcher can let a ball go and tell by the turn, 
or bias, or curve, where it will go. The Holy Spirit can counter- 
act the bias of your life. 

"What did Hezekiah do? In the first year of his reign, in the 
first month, he opened the door of the house of the Lord. 'Now 
lie brought in the priests, and they went into the inner part of 
the house and cleansed it.' And it took them eight days 
to get through the dirt and the filth to the altar. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 185 

"Shut yourself up against God and open your heart to the 
Devil and see how much rotten filth you will have. God has a 
hard time to clean your hearts and gizzards out. All this is typi- 
cal of the church today. The church has no song like she used 
to have. Why, God bless your heart, every church in this coun- 
try is breaking her neck to get some little evolution, some squirt- 
gun preacher, but will have nothing to do with God in these 
days. It was the preacher that stood up and preached the truth 
that won out. 

"What did Hezekiah do? He began with the priests— let the 
preachers preach God's word to the people and apologize. He 
restored the vessels to the house of the Lord. What is that? 
Bring the word of God back. Put it in the homes. Restore the 
family altar. It was a master stroke of the Devil when he made 
the prayer meeting. Prayer is needed in the home as well as 
the church. Prayer is not talking to God but when your heart 
feels what your lips express. 

"Sixteen years without song. Sixteen years the temple was 
shut up. Sixteen years no priest. Sixteen years no prayer. Six- 
teen years no song. In the first month he opened the house of 
the Lord and cleansed the temple. Then the priests when they 
had cleansed the temple, put a burnt offering on the altar and the 
song of the Lord began. Then the people began to sing as they 
had not sung for sixteen years because there had been no fire on 
that altar. No worship of God. So you can worship old Mother 
Eddy, fall at the feet of Unitarianism and Spiritualism, and kneel 
at the feet of culture, but you will never make the land sing until 
you bring back the word of God into the homes. And I tell you, 
then, that America will sing as she has not in all her history. The 
world is just waiting. Decatur is waiting, for the church of 
Jesus Christ to stop worshiping strange gods, and get down the 
Word of God. So go home and burn the novels, and break up 
that prize that you have carried home, and put the Bible on the 
center table, and have family prayers, and you will begin to sing, 
and so will your husband and family, and so will all Decatur." 



186 Life and Labors oi 



EVENING SERMON 

Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my 
words shall not pass away. — Matthew 24 :35. 

"When Tom Paine was about to publish his infidel book, 'The 
Age of Reason,' he sent the manuscript to Benjamin Franklin, 
who at that time was a doubter of some of the essentials of 
Christianity, and asked his criticism. Benjamin Franklin re- 
turned the manuscript with this appendage: 'Burn it; never un- 
chain that tiger; if the world is so bad with Jesus Christ what 
would it be without him?' This affords an unanswerable argu- 
ment to the people who are opposers of Jesus Christ. 

"What harm has the gospel of Jesus Christ ever done the 
world ? Show me a nation whose power has crumbled and which 
has been sunken into oblivion that followed its teachings. Show 
me a man who followed it and who ended his life an outcast; a 
women, if she believed in and worshiped Jesus Christ, as the son 
of God, who merchandized her womanhood. 

"Is anything greater or more potent than the gospel of Jesus 
Christ? By it the graves have burst their bonds and history has 
been changed. 

"It only needs an application of common sense to understand 
most of the Bible. If I could understand all of the Bible I would 
doubt its authenticity. But I am not surprised that many do not 
understand this book and are blind leaders of the blind. The 
only truth needed to save you is found in John 3:16 — 'For God 
so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son that who- 
soever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting 
life.' 

" 'Did you ever think of the wealth that perished when Paradise 
was lost? Did you ever think of the glory of Eden, the first es- 
tate of man? It was a dream of God, glowing in ineffable beauty ; 
rimmed about with blue mountains from whose moss covered 
peaks a thousand glassy streams spread out in midair and were 
like a thousand bridal veils kissing a thousand rainbows from 
the sun ; an archipelago of gorgeous colorings flecked with green 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 187 

isles where grapevines staggered from tree trunks with the nectar 
of its clusters ; where peach and plum and red cherries and every 
kind of berries shone like drops of ruby and pearl, a wilderness 
of flowers, redolent of eternal spring, pulsing with bird song; 
where dappled fawn played upon the banks of violets, leopards, 
peaceful and tame, lounged under the copses of the magnolia. 
Tigers harmless and tame, played on the snowy beds of lilies. 
Lions panted in jungles cf roses — a billowy landscape festooned 
with tangled creepers bright with perennial bloom, curtained about 
with sweet scented groves. The air was softened by a dreamy 
haze of perpetual summer ; through the mist there flowed a trucu- 
lent river alternately gleaming in the sunlight then darkening in 
the shadow. Down in some dusky bower fresh from the hand 
of God, slept Adam, and from a painless wound sprang a being 
blithesome as the air ; her hair hung as strands of gold. He gazed 
upon God's cap-sheaf of creation, woman. His first thought for 
the happiness of man and the perpetuity of the human race. Man 
was a fool, for in the exercise of his God-given free will, he ate 
of the fruit and fell and the scene shifted from joy to sorrow, 
from life to death, from roses to thorns.' 

"Few people understand the Bible because they are too con- 
temptibly lazy to study it. You don't understand other books and 
subjects without study, and you have got to study the Bible. God 
puts no premium on laziness. We are not thus inconsistent about 
the common things of life. 

"But not understanding all the Bible is no reason for not be- 
lieving it. If you believe only what you understand you would 
be dumbfounded to see how much you do not know. You don't 
know the A B C of the common things about you. 

"More people here can't tell how many legs a fly has than can 
tell. If you don't know that how can I suppose that you know 
about the fly's marvelous feet, with their thousands of bow hairs 
by which they can roost on the ceiling upside down and never fall 
off? How can I suppose that you know the greater marvels of 
the eight thousand eyes of the fly, with four thousand distinct 
and perfectly formed lenses, each a perfect prism? Photographs 
have been taken with lenses from a fly's eye. By the aid of a 



i88 Life and Labors of 

magnifying glass a professor at Berlin has looked through such 
a lens and seen a church steeple two blocks away. 

"You are a fool for saying you won't believe God because you 
don't understand all about the Bible when you don't understand 
about a fly. 

"Talk about things in the Bible that minute you don't need to 
go to the Bible, you poor fool. There is nothing wonderful about 
a fly's eyes. It is known that a certain beetle has fifty thousand 
and sixteen eyes, and the common dragon fly, devil's darning 
needle we used to call them, has 25,088 eyes, and the common 
silk worm moth has 12,500, and the moth that flies around in 
August, has 28,000 eyes. Don't fuss about things in the Bible 
that you don't understand. 

"Begin to look around you and see how many things you don't 
understand, and don't sneer about the things of God you don't 
understand, because you don't want to understand them. 

"You can't understand what God means when he says, 'Do not 
commit adultery ;' I heard of a person who staid away from this 
meeting because he said it would make him feel uncomfortable 
to come and hear these talks. A fellow said to his sweetheart, 
'Don't go down to the tabernacle; come and go with me to the 
Cassell theater ;' that is as incongruous as going to a funeral. 

"Suppose I could transform this audience into a clinic, and had 
a dead body for a subject. I bring on the scalpel, make an in- 
cision, and hold up before you two pink threads. They are just 
alike. You cannot detect one iota of difference with the most 
powerful microscope. Can you explain to me how one takes up 
the scenes of every day life and portrays them in the brain, be- 
cause it is the nerve of sight? And how the other conveys sound 
waves so you are able to distinguish the bark of a dog, the blow- 
ing of a whistle, and the lowing of kine? You are compelled to 
admit your ignorance and yet you believe in the work of these 
nerves. 

"The design tells of a designer. This building never evolved. 
Creation tells me of a creator. It is asinine, idiotic nonsense to 
talk about creation by fortuitous concurrence of atoms. The 
scientific mind is compelled to accept the creative act of God. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 189 

"I have too much sense to let a teacher teach that to my child. 
I. send back word that we believe the Bible account of creation. 
Evolution is a bastard theory. It has never been proven. It is 
possible to develop one species but not to change one species to 
another. Senator Berry, of Illinois, showed me a hog for which 
he had paid a great price. I could feed and dress that hog up in 
very fine style and call it sweet pet names, but it would squeal for 
slop just like a pig that was not worth thirty cents. That old 
hog would never be happier than when his nose was digging into 
a malodorous manure heap? And all that could be done for it 
would not change it into a mocking bird. 

"Why don't things evolve a little in our day ? Here is a watch. 
You say the case and the mainspring and the hairspring and all 
the works are evidence of its design and the manufacture. You 
are in error. Away back in the dark and mysterious ages by a 
fortuitous combination of atoms as they danced about, it being 
presumed that each had a will, there was evolved what we call a 
watch ! If a man should make a crack like that before an audi- 
ence a lot of people would say he was a marvelous philosopher. 
I should say he was an old fool. 

"But you say you can't believe the story about Jonah's whale. 
You say Jonah could not have made that submarine voyage in 
the stateroom of a whale, sister. Jonah had the modern sub- 
marine torpedo boat beat to a frazzle. There are 53 species of 
whales and there are only two of them that cannot swallow a 
man. 

"Some of you read the Literary Digest. Its issue of April 4, 
1896, told of James Bartley, a hardy whaleman, being swallowed 
by a whale which had been harpooned on the Mediterranean sea. 
Then the whale was drawn up to the side of the ship and after 
a day and a night its stomach was cut open. The man was 
found. Although he was unconscious for a week and remained 
in the hospital for a month, he was able to tell minutely about his 
being caught by the whale as he was thrown out of the broken 
boat and about being forced down its slimy throat by its contrac- 
tions. 

"You are a chump to find any fault with the Jonah story, when 



190 Life and Labors of 

a whale had actually swallowed a man in modern times. You 
ought to keep posted. Why, God could make a whale that could 
swallow a ship and all that were in it. Don't leave God out of 
consideration. Keep up with things that are happening. 

"I don't ask you to take your stand on the losing side. Hell 
will go down and God will be victorious. When all the infidels 
are dead and every switch has been closed and locked, the old 
Book will thunder on God's way of marvelous triumph. 

"It is not an accident that Christian nations stand in the front 
of the battle of civilization. I believe the word of God because it 
shows the fulfillment of prophecy. Anyone can foretell things 
but it is a different matter to have them come out right. 

"I believe in the prophecies and their fulfillment. Isaiah proph- 
esied one hundred years before it happened that Cyrus would 
overthrow Babylon, and it was destroyed so completely that the 
later world denied its very existence for centuries. 

"Take the churches out of old Decatur, and the Christians, 
and no decent man will live in it after six months. I have got to 
find the first man or woman that don't believe in the Bible that is 
not living in some sin that book condemns. 

"The greatest prophecy ever uttered was that of the text. For 
the man that spoke the words was a homeless wanderer with the 
ground for his bed, a stone for his pillow, and the canopy of 
heaven for his covering; there were no typewriters, telegrams 
or newspapers in those days to preserve his words. Yet Chris- 
tianity is firmly fixed. It has strengthened the arm and purified 
the hearts of mankind; it has rescued the home from being a 
harem and is the greatest and only refining influence in the world 
today. 

"You might burn every one of the 160,000,000 copies of the 
Bible that are scattered through the w r orld but then you have 
not destroyed the Bible. You may go to all the libraries and re- 
move from their shelves all books that mention the Bible. All 
the books of poetry that have inspired and blessed, but even then 
you have not destroyed the Bible. Come with me to the art gal- 
leries and rip off the walls all of the paintings that have enrap- 
ured men in all ages, then to the studies and burn the songs that 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 191 

have welled from the hearts of men, but even then, God pity you, 
you old infidel, after you have destroyed all these you go to the 
cemetery there to find the Bible chiseled in stone to defy you." 

''Twenty years ago one dark stormy night, I groped and felt 
my way to Jesus and laid my head on his breast. 'Jesus, I am 
tired of swearing and booze-fighting and sneering,' I says, 'I am 
tired, and I want to rest.' And I heard the most blessed words 
that ever fell on mortal ears, 'Though your sins be as scarlet 
they shall be white as snow.' " 



EVENING SERMON 

"I am going to preach a sermon tonight, and hope to have 
•something to say in keeping with the visiting friends' enthusiasm. 
I haven't any text. I don't know what to call this — a sermon, 
lesson or whatever you choose. At the time of the death of 
President McKinley for five minutes the wheels of every railroad 
and factory stood still, the farmer stood by his plow in the fur- 
row, the banker by his money uncounted, the merchant with his 
cloth unmeasured and the grocer with his commodity unweighed. 
The student closed his book and the miner dropped his pick. All 
over the land for five minutes business and commerce stood still 
and in that method we testified to the world the inestimable value 
we place on character and in that way we were enabled to in- 
delibly impress on our minds and the minds of the succeeding 
generation the fact that we place a high estimate on the memory 
of the man who gave his life for the betterment of the country 
and of the people. I am glad we have a Fourth of July. I think 
we should uncork our enthusiasm and let the world know the 
high estimate of the fact that it took blood and brawn and muscle 
and life to create the greatest nation the world ever saw and 
ever made. 

"It is a great thing to have a labor day when we are reminded 
how much we are indebted to the dinner bucket; it is a great 
thing to have an Easter and recall him who was born in the mal- 
odor of unwashed beasts. It is a great thing to have Christmas 



192 Life and Labors of 

when we are reminded of Jesus Christ and what his birth brought 
to the world. It is a great thing to have a Thanksgiving when 
the children all come home beneath the old roof and walk once 
more in the old paths and live over the days of youth and talk 
of those who are not in the home. It is a great thing to sit around 
the laden table and recall the fact that as a nation we have never 
gone to bed hungry. 

"It is a great thing to have these times to which we can refer. 
And notwithstanding how many people there are that do not 
appreciate the opportunities. It is like a fellow shipwrecked on 
an island where everybody was little — six inches high and Nature 
was proportionate in size. He was the biggest thing they ever 
saw ; he created a sensation and they used to request him to notify 
them when he was going to walk out so they could notify the 
mayor to call out the militia to warn the people when he was com- 
ing lest he step on them. And they asked him not to swing his 
arms for fear he would knock down a skyscraper and wipe off a 
church steeple. 

"Then he was shipwrecked on an island where the people were 
all big and he was the smallest thing they had ever seen, and he 
created a sensation. He met a giant and wanted to skidoo. But 
the giant picked him up and put him into his pocket and took him 
home to his little girl nine years old and thirty-two feet high and 
she had a cage made for him and hung it up in her chatelaine bag 
when she went out calling. And her friends begged to play with 
him and the young ladies nearly smothered him with affection. 

"When I imagined myself on the island where everything was 
little how chesty I became and when I imagined myself on the 
island where everything was big how small I felt, so where you 
are has a great deal to do with your size. The smallest man on 
God's dirt is the man that spends his time around a grog shop 
knocking the white collar off a mug of beer and then staggering 
home. You are big or little not according to your physique but 
owing to where you are. You are like a girl of about 17 who is 
introduced to a young man and asks, 'Who is he?' When she is 
twenty-five she asks; 'What is he?' And when she is about thirty- 
five she asks, 'Mamma, for God's sake, where is he?' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 193 

"Like 'Squire Jones who is 'Squire Jones in his jake-rube town 
because everything in town magnifies him. Take him to Chicago 
and let him walk down the street between the skyscrapers and 
trolley cars and let him stand at the corner of State and Madison 
at five o'clock in the afternoon, and you know what happens to 
the squire— why, it is just squeezed out of him until he is just 
ordinary Jones. 

"A grasshopper sat on a sun flower and said, T am the biggest 
thing in the world; when I jump off the earth will tremble,' and 
he jumped off in front of a turkey gobler and the old hen came 
along and said, 'Did you see a fat young grasshopper pass this 
way ?' 'Yes/ said the turkey gobler, 'he didn't pass, he stopped ;' 
and when that grasshopper was trying to adjust himself to a 
comfortable position in the craw of that turkey he thought how 
little he was. You are a bigger man when you sit in the church 
beside your wife than when you loaf down in some livery stable 
or some grog shop. And the bigger man when you walk home 
sober than when you reel home a spewing, drunken, vomiting 
sot. I want to tell you that the banker is a bigger man than the 
brewer. The barber is a bigger man than the brewer. The 
brewer is the smallest specimen of humanity that I know of on 
earth. 

"The fact that God has put this tabernacle here is another 
evidence that God has given you a chance to grow. I want to 
say something that will help you to grow big and help you to 
put your name in italics. How many babies there are. Baby 
lawyers — baby doctors — and baby wives and baby husbands — peo- 
ple small and dried up notwithstanding the chances they have had. 
This hope for better things is Nature's clamor. That is why the 
emigrants leave the fatherland while the man here goes west. 
He wants to be a mountain instead of a molehill. It is something 
in you that wants to develop, something that wants to better your 
condition. Not to grow and not to be a better man when you 
have such opportunities is to bring yourself under the scorn and 
the contempt of those that do want to grow. 

"A midget in body can be turned into financial account in a 
dime museum. But a midget in mind and character is a carbuncle 

13 



194 Life and Labors of 

on the neck of the body politic. You cannot look up to a runt in 
mind and character unless you are married to the runt. It is like 
the husband whose wife said that she had a dream. She dreamed 
that she attended the auction where husbands were being sold and 
one brought $500 but another sold for $10,000; her husband said 
that he was like the latter, but the wife said, 'You miserable little 
runt ; husbands like you sold three bunches for a nickle, and that 
was a big price.' 

"The one man that I find that God condemns is the man that 
hides his talent in a napkin. 'Go up, thou mighty man of valor,' 
said God to Gideon. David climbed from the sheepfold and be- 
came king, and God said to him: 'Dave, you are a man after 
my own heart.' God likes to see a man get a move on him and 
climb out of the grog shop, out of drunkenness into sobriety; out 
of the brothel into purity. God wants men to do things that are 
right in the world, and so do we all. Humility that wants to re- 
main little, simply because it is easier to swing in a hammock, to 
sleep in the shade, and to drink lemonade with a straw, is some- 
thing that is vastly different from that magnificent manhood, that 
is willing to pull off his coat, sell it, and buy a sword; and go out 
into the arena of the world and drive it up to the hilt into the 
damnable rot of the world that curses and blights the land. 

"You have got to have desire to grow. You have got to feel 
your need to be a Christian, and you must need to be virtuous 
and to be honest. You must want to — like a miser wants money, 
like a hog wants slop — and like a politician wants office. It is a 
good deal like watering a horse — a bow-legged, pigeon-toed, red- 
headed, freckle-faced kid, can ride a Kentucky thoroughbred to 
water, but a college professor with mutton-chop whiskers and a 
mortar-board cap and forty-nine diplomas can't make the horse 
drink. 

"A plant grows because it takes moisture from the ground and 
the sunshine which it needs to build itself up. A farmer has 
learned that it pays to feed corn to cattle that costs at so much 
a pound. The farmer has learned that it pays to feed corn to 
hogs costing so much a bushel then selling the pork at so much a 
pound. All right. Then I say to you it is better to feed boys 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 195 

and girls on the Bible and religion than on the Decatur breweries. 
I say it pays better to send the boy to school and church than to 
send them to the breweries and grog-shops and beer, it is better 
to do it. Anything but dull times tell you that. 

"I heard that some of that crowd was going around the streets 
of this town with a petition trying to get the papers not to publish 
anything that I said in these meetings on the temperance question. 
I will show you before I get through with you. I tell you the 
gang has got cold feet already. I haven't begun on them yet. I 
am just giving you a chance to get mentally adjusted now. Any- 
thing but dull time, you bet that. I want to tell you if I can't meet 
them on that ground I will give it up. You just try that. If you 
want to play that boycott I can play it with you to a frazzle. 
Don't think Jesus Christ can't fight. You can't sit down and intim- 
idate people by saying you will withdraw your patronage from 
them. What does your cussed patronage amount to, anyway? 
Just come on and I will play it to a finish. We have got the 
best advantage to make something of ourselves in this country 
that the world has ever seen. Why? Because there never 
were better opportunities than in this day. The newspapers are a 
better college than Abraham Lincoln ever had; telegraph lines 
run to every corner of the world and for a paltry ten or fifteen 
cents a week you have it brought right to your breakfast table 
every morning. 

"According to the United States government last year we had 
in this country 15,000,000 men over thirty years of age; 12,000,- 
000 were educated in the common schools; 1,000,000 of them 
could neither read nor write. 650,000 graduated from the high 
school, 350,000 from the universities and colleges. There is pub- 
lished in the United States a book, 'Who is Who.' It contains the 
names of ten thousand men in the headlines and spot-light of 
their profession and calling. And out of the 12,000,000 men who 
went to the common school one in nine thousand had his name 
on the pages of that book and out of the million who could neither 
read nor write none had his name in that book. Out of the 650,000 
that graduated out of the high school one out of four hundred had 
his name in that book. And out of the 350,000 that graduated 



196 Life and Labors of 



his 
iris 
ad- 



from the universities and colleges one in forty-two had 
name in that book. It pays then to feed the boys and girls 
something that will make them noble and grand. I wouldn't 
vise you to start out and build a character like a woman bakes 
cake. I heard a woman tell how to bake a cake. She says, 'take 
some milk and flour. If I am going to make a big cake I use lots 
of flour and if I am going to make a small one I don't use so 
much. Put in some butter and a pinch of salt. Put in an egg and 
beat it like you would a carpet, only not so hard. Then a little 
extract, whatever you want, and mix the dough to a consistency.' 
Let a woman bake a cake with those directions and it is good ; let 
a man bake it and you could use it for a drive wheel on a locomo- 
tive. 

"I would not advise you to build a character like a woman 
builds a sewing machine. She grabs a monkey wrench and a screw 
driver and she takes off everything that should remain on the 
machine, pours some oil over the belt and starts it up and away it 
goes like a man going to the undertaker when his mother-in-law 
is dead. A lot of you fellows try to build a character and won't 
leave out a lot of things ; pull out drunkenness, pull out whiskey, 
pull out cards and quit sneering at God and shove in prayer, 
shove in sobriety and shove in honesty. Push in virtue and man- 
hood, put in a lot of things that you have been leaving out if you 
want to build something that will stand in the Day of Judgment, 
and when you stand before God. Do your best and you will never 
have to wear out shoe leather looking for a job. If you are 
going to succeed in business you have got to have grit. Grit that 
says 'no' so loud as to stagger hell when asked to do wrong. Grit 
that means 'yes' so loud that all the angels hear you and cheer. 

"A poor opportunity did not keep Ben Franklin from walking 
the streets of Philadelphia gnawing a loaf of bread. It did not 
keep Thomas Edison sitting at a telegraph desk sending messages 
at $40 a month. It did not keep David tending sheep all his life. 

"I tell you God can give you a chance to be a Christian, but 
God and Jesus Christ and all the angels cannot make you go to 
heaven if you don't want to. God can give you a chance but if 
you are not willing to embrace it, don't blame God. Like a young 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 197 

fellow who swells up and says: 'I will never marry.' Let some 
girl come along and he falls so deeply in love it makes his breast- 
bone ache and in less than a month, unless some other cuts him 
out, he will be pricing furniture and looking for a flat, and in 
about eight months he will be hanging pictures and putting down 
carpets. 

"How are we going to get the desire? Well, that is what I 
am trying to help you to get. You might as well ask me how a 
tack must feel in a keg of nails. I think it must feel (if a tack 
could feel) like it wanted to be the biggest one. I am not going 
to stay a tack. Put yourself under the influence that will insure 
you to be better, if you want to be good. Don't hang around the 
grog shop. Read the right books. Many a boy chews and cusses 
and swears simply because he imitates his old dad. Every gambler 
imitated somebody. So does every drunken sot, every fallen 
woman. 

"A peasant boy walked into the Louvre in Paris and looked at 
a painting of Dore's and that look inspired him. Up in Chicago 
several boys used to have their rendezvous in barrels and dry 
goods boxes, and read Deadwood Dick and dime novels and they 
went out and held up the street car barns for a measley $2,000 and 
had to murder three men to do it, and three of those boys dropped 
through the scaffold and the other will spend his life in the peni- 
tentiary at Joliet. Why? Because of the surrounding influences. 

"I tell you that influence will inspire you to be a man. And 
you have got to have a definite aim. Make up your mind, 'I am 
going to be a Christian if all hell sneers at me.' If all the devils 
in hell sat out there led by the Prince of Damnation, and sneered 
at me, I would shoot God's truth square at the damnable whiskey 
gang in old Decatur as sure as you breathe. I will give that gang 
a few things if they don't keep their mouths shut. I will cut loose 
and blister them until they hunt their holes. I will give them fair 
warning. You have some of the lowest scoundrels this side of 
the penitentiary in Decatur — I can deliver the goods, and I will 
do it — if it comes to a showdown, just in a jiffy. I am loading 
up and when I cut loose you will want to wear an asbestos suit 
around here. 



198 Life and Labors of 

"You have got to have a definite aim — you must want to do. 
You must want to damn people or you must want to be honest. 
Like a couple of boys — the old man was going away, and he said 
to the boys, 'Mind your ma, and if you are good I will reward 
you, and if you are bad I will tan you.' When he got back he 
found the boys had had a rough house, and they had gone to bed, 
And his wife was complaining about what they had done. And 
one of the boys said 'Gee, hear pa. He's down with ma. Hear 
pa coming up ? I am going to get up and pray/ The other said, 
'I am going to get up and put something on, I tell you/ 

"Many a man cannot tell whether God wants him to be an 
auctioneer or a college professor, and he keeps out of the poor 
house only because he was fortunate enough to marry a good, 
strong woman who could take in washing. 

"Study your capabilities like the story — 'Kid, what are you 
going to be when you are a man?' 'I am going to be an electri- 
cian.' 'Why ?' 'Because I like to monkey with door bells/ 

"You may not be able to be a search light or a whistle but you 
can be a cog in the machine. You could no more teach some men 
to progress than you could teach a torn cat to sing the Oratorio 
of the Messiah. There are men that are looking into my face to- 
night who might have towered up like church steeples over all 
competitors if you had used the noble influences that you are sur- 
rounded with. It is as impossible to make a silk purse out of a 
sow's ear as in the days of Solomon. The man that succeeds is 
not the one that waits for something in which he can show his 
superiority over all others but the one that does the thing next 
to hand. 

"God is going to give you a chance. Don't you know that a 
plow horse makes more miles in a year than the best thoroughbred 
horse on the race track? The reason that so many whiskey- 
soaked, round-shouldered, good-for-nothing men loaf around the 
street corners with their hands in their pockets, was because when 
they were young they got balled up and they cashed in too quick. 
They had no ginger, pepper, tobasco sauce, and they have lost out 
on it — they wabbled. They were pink tea and ice cream nonenti- 
ties. Grant started as a tanner in old Illinois. Thomas Edison 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 199 

invented a phonograph which would reproduce any word except 
that it would not reproduce the letter S. For instance the word 
species. It dropped the S and said 'pecies.' He worked 17 to 
24 hours a day for over a year, to perfect that machine. He did 
it, and it brings him over a million dollars in a year. 

"You have a flaw in your character. They can't trust you. 
That is the reason that you did not succeed. You had something 
that you want to get rid of, and God is going to give you a chance 
here. Cyrus Field crossed the Atlantic 52 times and worked 11 
years to lay the cable; .while the world mocked and said that he 
was a Visionary.' He laid it in 1868, and it has never missed 
once from that day to this. A dreamer — but he won out. 

"The spark would not light were it not for friction. If it were 
not for friction of wheels on the rails, the railroads would be 
impossible. And friction robs the locomotive of one-fourth her 
power. But if you oil the track you make railroading impossible, 
and the most powerful locomotive could not move a car the thou- 
sandth part of an inch if you were to oil the track and remove 
the friction. And it is that which will bring out the best that is 
in you. And we will see if you are made of the stuff that turns 
to water. So many make a good beginning but like the fellow 
that was killed by falling off the sky-scraper, they stop too quick. 
An aim may be high but there may not be powder enough to 
make the bullet pierce the opposition. One day you go at it like 
a cow that is licking salt, and the next day like a fellow going 
through a graveyard reading epitaphs. 

"I will tell you something of hindrances. Your size depends 
upon your mind — on brain, not bulk. Some fellows bulk big but 
brain little. You cannot measure manhood with a tapeline around 
the biceps, nor success by the rattle in the cash register. Nor by 
your rating with Dun and Bradstreet. That don't show whether 
you have won out or lost. The engineer is bigger than the engine 
because he drives the engine — the captain is greater than the ship 
— an electric motor no bigger than my fist can do more work than 
a 12-foot windmill on a 60- foot tower that you could see five miles. 
You can measure a rosebud by its size. That's easy. But to 
measure it by its fragrance — that is impossible. 



200 Life and Labors of 

"The angels said, 'let us hide the appearance of Lincoln where 
the world will never find him.' Hide that great big, kind, gener- 
ous, manly, scholarly, God-fearing soul in that long, lean, lank, 
gaunt, homely body. They gave him a log cabin in the wilderness 
for a home and for employment gave him common work like poling 
a flat-boat on the river and clerking in the country store. While 
drifting down stream he was solving problems that ever after- 
ward helped him return. And while clerking in the store he was 
learning whole chapters from the book of humanity, which be- 
came golden rounds in the ladder of fame which he climbed to its 
very top and while other young men who had better chances than 
he loafed around the street corner with their hands run in their 
breeches pocket, or were lying asleep in their feather bed and say- 
ing young men didn't have a chance. 

"After the day's work Lincoln would spread himself on the 
floor in front of the old-fashioned fireplace and spread the ashes 
thin on the dirt floor and with a hickory stick for a pencil solve 
problems. He read the lives of great men that inspired him to 
say, 'I will be somebody/ and then he would crawl in the loft 
and go to sleep and the angels smiled and the stars would blink 
through the cracks upon him and the birds next day would sing 
and seem to say: 'Brace up, Abe, don't cash in yet, brace up/ 

"I don't know how it happened but the world could not keep 
him hid any longer. One day in the slave mart in New Orleans 
he saw children ripped from the arms of their mothers; he saw 
wives torn from the loving embrace of husbands and sold on the 
auction block, and they went away, never to see each other again. 
He heard the bay of the blood hounds as they chased the blacks 
through the swamps and as the tears streamed down his cheek 
he said : 'By the Almighty God, if ever I get chance to hit that I 
will hit it hard.' And the world could keep him hid no longer. 
And one morning this world rolled out of bed and rubbed its eyes 
and began a still hunt for a great man. They struck a new scent. 
A new trail led them out through weeds up the hill to the log 
cabin and the world walked up and rapped at the door. 

"Abraham Lincoln, so big, so high, so tall, looked around and 
stepped forth and scrambled upon the pedestal where he looked 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 201 

down on all competitors. What is obscure today may become 
famous tomorrow. Emerson said, 'Write a better book, deliver 
a better lecture, make a better neighbor, preach a better sermon.' 
Opportunity knocks at your door but once. I like that song you 
brought over from Bloomington— 'Keep Sweet.' A merry heart 
does good like a medicine case. Solomon was no Dowieite nor 
Christian Scientist. That old Jew had sense. 

"Don't wait until your wife dies until you tell your neighbors 
what a good woman she was. Don't wait. Brag on her while she is 
all here. Tell her, 'that coffee was good. That baking powder bis- 
cuit was fine eating. The sauer kraut and bacon was done to a 
turn.' Brag on her when she is alive and you will see those old 
bends in her form straighten up on the installment plan. I tell 
you that little smile that used to play around the corners of her eye 
when you took her gum drops and candy hearts will come back 
again. Just brag on her while she is alive. Don't wait for the 
obituary notice in the newspaper when she is dead. She can't 
read them then." 



/ beseech you, by the love of the Spirit. — 
Romans 15:30. 

"I don't know whether it has been your privilege to hear a man 
or woman say that they loved the Spirit, or not. I have heard 
people say they loved God — I have heard people say T love Christ.' 
I have never forgotten when I heard a man say for the first time, 
T love the Spirit.' The plan of redemption was opened by the 
love of God. If we believe in the Trinity then I believe it is neces- 
sary for me to believe in the love of God. That is, the Spirit has 
love equal to God. We want to study the place which the Spirit 
has in the plan of the love of God as shown in Jesus Christ. 

"In Gen. 1 :2 we read : 'And the Spirit of God moved upon 
the face of the waters.' Moved, literally, means brooded. Like 
a mother bird that hovers with love over her little ones. And the 
Holy Spirit is hovering over this world. And some say, 'Can you 
give an explanation of so little being said about the love of the 
Spirit in the New Testament?' In John 16:26 we read: 'When 
the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the 



Life and Labors of 






Father, even the Spirit of Truth, which proceedeth from the 
Father ; he shall testify of me.' And the other passage : 'Howbeit 
it is expedient for you that I go away — for if I go not away the 
Spirit will not come.' This is future tense — the Spirit was not 
there — but when I am gone away, then I will send him — it is 
always future tense. 'And when the Spirit of truth is come he shall 
guide you into all truth, and show you all things to the counsels 
of the God-head' and what he hears there he tells. It is necessary 
for you to live in harmony that you may hear the indwelling power 
of the Spirit in you. If not, the secrets of God will be Greek and 
Latin to you. And if God speaks: Lots of church members do 
not live in harmony — led by the Spirit — hence they are not God's 
at all. 

"Another explanation is this: it is not necessary to have a 
great number of texts — Jesus was not sent of God because the 
Bible says so, so many times, but because the first statement was 
true. So then it says something about the Spirit of God that is 
true, then I don't need an increased number of texts or verses 
to prove it. Jesus came into the world through motherhood, and 
being in the form of God He thought it not robbery to be equal 
with God — but made Himself of no reputation, and came in the 
likeness of sinful flesh, and became obedient unto death, even the 
death of the cross. 

"We struggle for reputation. We struggle for our position. 
I sometimes think that I care too much for my reputation. When 
I live as God tells me to live, I should rest content on that. God 
has taken care of me for twenty years, and I have been lied 
about, slandered and blackmailed. But after all about one of 
the worst things that can be said of you over your coffin is : 'You 
had no enemies.' Lots of people live 'Good Lord, Good Devil' 
sort of lives, and they never rouse the Devil. I think if I lived so 
that one of the saloon keepers or brewers should slap me on the 
back and regard me as a hail-fellow-well-met, I should consider 
myself back-slidden. Jesus said, 'Blessed are ye when men shall 
revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil 
against you falsely, for my sake.' You are going some then. 
He was willing to do anything to advance the Kingdom of God. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 203 

So am I. I am willing to do all that I can to advance the 
Kingdom of God. Like when I first came here one day I went 
into the Herald office. (You remember Mr. Young — and you 
asked me about the way that I said things. And I told you the 
story of David and Goliath). I will tell you that story here. 

"I can just picture the old man saying, 'Dave, you had better 
take some cheese and wine, and go out and see how the boys are 
getting along.' Dave goes, and Goliath comes out. And Dave said, 
'Who is that big lobster?' 'That's the head cheese in the bunch 
of Philistines — the main works.' 'Why don't you go out and soak 
the guy?' 'The bunch all get cold feet when he comes out here. 
He does his little stunt every morning.' 'Oh, you fellows make 
me sick. Give me a sling and some stones,' and he soaked him 
in his 'cocoa' between the lamps, and Dave drew Goliath's sword 
and chopped off his block and the gang skidooed. There is a 
gang that would have brain fever if I talked in Bible terms, who 
know what I mean when I put it that way, and you know too, if 
. you have read the Bible history. 

"And Jesus became obedient unto death. Because He did what 
He did they killed Him. If He had lived their way they would 
have been friendly to Him. The people whose sins He reproved 
were the church people and they killed Him. It was the church 
crowd and the Unitarians of His day that killed Him — they cruci- 
fied Him because He said that He was the Son of God. And God 
highly exalted Him — and He exalts every man that does His 
bidding. 

"If you would know the love of the Spirit read Paul's epistles. 
There He calls us out of sin. The measure of the Father's love 
is shown in that He gave His only begotten Son — the measure of 
Christ's love by what He endured and the love of the Spirit is 
shown by what He has done and is doing and shall continue to do, 
to win and to woo you from sin. It is time to begin to realize that 
the Spirit has love for us equal to God the Father and Jesus 
Christ the Son. And you will never fully realize His power in 
your life until you give Him the rightful place that belongs to 
Him. Some one was needed to touch our hearts and to make us 
feel our need of this religion that Jesus provided. Christ is the 



204 Life and Labors of 

way but the Spirit is the guide. There is no conversion without 
conviction and no conviction without the work of the Spirit. 
You have got to get back so God can use your life. God works on 
people through your consistency. So you can see the way that the 
Spirit of God is handicapped by worldly church members. So 
I pound away at the church members. As soon as they quit the 
theater going and the card playing and there comes to be a spir- 
itual atmosphere, then God can work. The Spirit of God has 
power not only to save you but to keep you. 'But if the Spirit 
that raised up Jesus from the dead dwelleth in you, He that raised 
up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies 
by His Spirit that dwelleth in you.' There is a powerful verse. 
Somehow I like to think that when the Spirit came to take up His 
abode in my heart He would abide. That I should never be alone. 
How we ought to thank the Spirit and love Him. A poem has 
been given me by a friend and illustrates my feeling: 

"The light of the Word shines brighter and brighter, 
As wider and wider God opens my eyes; 
My trials and burdens seem lighter and lighter, 
And brighter and brighter the heavenly prize. 

"The wealth of this world is poorer and poorer 

As further and further it fades from my sight ; 
The price of my calling is surer and surer 

As straighter and straighter I walk in the Light. 

"My waiting on Jesus is truer and truer 

As longer and longer I lean on His breast; 
Without Him I am nothing since clearer and clearer 
And more and more safely in Jesus I rest. 

"My joy in my Savior is growing and growing, 
As stronger and stronger I trust in His word ; 
My peace like a river is flowing and flowing 
As harder and harder I lean on the Lord." 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 205 



And the people had a mind to work. — 
Neh. 4:6. 

"Nehemiah was a cup-bearer to King Artaxerxes. And the 
news of the deplorable condition of the city of Jerusalem was 
brought to him by his friend Hanani— who had been to Jerusalem 
and seen for himself. And the news made such a sad impression 
upon Nehemiah that when he walked in the presence of the 
king, the old monarch noticed that his countenance was sad and 
inquired the cause. He informed the king what he had learned 
regarding the city — that there were none that were taking an 
interest to rebuild her broken down walls, and asked of the 
king permission to return for the purpose of rebuilding the walls. 

"And the king readily acceded to his request and in addition 
gave Nehemiah an order upon the keeper of the forests to give 
Nehemiah all the lumber that he might need. And in the incred- 
ibly short space of 52 days, I am informed in the Word of God, 
that the walls had been rebuilt. And the secret of success is found 
in the words of my text— 'And the people had a mind to work.' 
There were others in captivity that knew as much about the con- 
dition as Nehemiah, but I am not informed that they were con- 
cerned about it. Enthusiasm is like the measles or the smallpox 
— it is contagious and you will communicate it to others. If you 
are a lazy, carping, good-for-nothing nonentity, other people will 
become as useless as you, if they are unfortunate enough to rub 
elbows with you. 

"So he went back for the purpose of rebuilding the walls. Now 
it is one thing to know what to do and another thing to do it. The 
trouble is not found in that people don't know what to do, but 
they are too lazy to do it. You may know how to shoe a horse, 
make a dress, write an editorial, but your knowledge is per- 
fectly useless to you unless you put that knowledge into practice. 
What you are and what you do is vastly more important than 
what you know. The existence or non-existence of an institution 
depends upon whether it meets or fails to meet the purpose for 
which it was intended. The world has no use for a drone. The 
world is not slow to discover that a thing is useless and will soon 



206 Life and Labors of 

slough you off. Scientists have discovered that the grog shop 
is the most useless institution this side of hell. And the world 
is not going to get sloughed into it. 

"All over the country that cry is coming up. They are sick, 
and disgusted, and nauseated, for the saloon has belched forth 
double distilled damnation, and brought men and women to squalor 
and want, and to misery, until people are disgusted with it today 
and say, 'We have enough of it.' Electricity meets the purpose 
for which it was intended, namely: to illuminate our homes and 
public edifices, and also in its application to mechanical pursuits. 
As with electricity so with everything. So if the church meets 
the purpose for which it was intended, namely, the salvation of the 
sin-cursed and damned, that will be found in the fact that you as 
individuals do or fail to do your duty. 

"Some people pretend to believe but never deliver the goods. 
'The people had a mind to work.' James said that 'faith is not 
worth shucks' or words to that effect. The most successful 
preachers against Christianity are inconsistent professors. The 
divine philosophy as demonstrated by a good many church mem- 
bers makes skeptics and agnostics, and Tom Paine, and Rousseau, 
and Voltaire, and Strauss, and Bauer, and .Renan and Tyndall, 
and Huxley, and Spencer, and all the rest of those old infidels. 
The bad sermons which people preach with their lives have far 
more influence than those that are preached with lips. Some 
people pray, and cheat some fellow in a horse trade the next 
day. I can tell more about your religion by trading horses with 
you on Thursday morning than by hearing you yell 'amen' in 
prayer meeting on Wednesday night. You kneel at the commun- 
ion table one day and then go out and persecute the poor. You 
sing about calvary, and heaven, and put the wrong figures on the 
ledger. The call boy will call tonight and say 'take out number 
17, or number 19,' and the engineer will get out this bad night. 
(I used to railroad), and this is a horrible night, and why does 
he do it? There is sufficient inducement. The farmer works 
through long days of sunshine and rain — what are the induce- 
ments — a granary filled with grain and food for the winter. Is 
not the salvation of a man from hell sufficient inducement for you 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 207 

to bend your knee in prayer? Is not it sufficient inducement for 
you to go and to pay your debts and quit gossipping about your 
neighbor ? 

"Is it not sufficient inducement for you to go to talk to a man 
about Christ? They say that Kossuth made up his mind that he 
would take up his abode in France and spend his last days there. 
And when the French government heard of his decision they sent 
a cruiser to meet the vessel on which he was coming and refused 
him permission to land, fearing lest his presence would incite 
the already disturbed peasants to insurrection, and when the 
people, thousands of whom had assembled in Marseilles, and 
crowded the quays and wharfs, learned of the decision to refuse 
Kossuth permission to make France his home, their disappoint- 
ment knew no bounds. But one Frenchman was not to be outdone 
by the government and so he leaped from the wharf and swam 
a mile and a half out to the ship and clambered up the ladder and 
stood shivering, wet and dripping, before Kossuth who said to 
him: 'How in the world did you ever do it?' 'Oh,' said the 
Frenchman with a smile, 'there are no difficulties to him that 
wills/ Kossuth looked at him and grasped him by the hand and 
said, 'Say that again, will you?' 'There are no difficulties to him 
that wills.' 'Thank you, sir, that shall be my watchword until 
the day that I die.' 

" 'There are no difficulties to him that wills.' Put that into 
religion. That is what men put into practice in business and law, 
medicine, farming and railroading. Then let us do it in religion. 
I understand what Jesus meant when He said : 'The children of 
the world are wiser in their generation than the children of light.' 

"I had a friend in Iowa, chairman of the republican state central 
committee, who said to me one time when I was at his home to 
dinner, 'It makes us tired to see the way that you try to go about 
doing something for God. Look here, we have the name of every 
senator and representative and know his family, lodge and church 
influence, whether he is Jew or Gentile, whether he is German, 
Norwegian, Dane, Irish, Scotch or Dago. We know whether he 
is in debt and how much and who holds the mortgage and we 
have every detail down in a book, and if we want that man's vote 



208 Life and Labors of 

for anything we know what people have the most influence with 
him in family, society, lodge, or business; and we will bring all 
those influences to bear to induce that man to vote our way. Now 
they had to get a liquor bill through the legislature and we had 
to get the votes of three of those men so we planned the thing 
and had 75 or a 100 telegrams sent them from men who stood 
nearest to them. That is the way we work to get men to vote, 
and if people worked that way to get us to Jesus Christ they 
could have had the whole bunch long ago/ 

" 'The people had a mind to work/ He cleared away the rub- 
bish. That is what I am trying to do. I have learned from long 
experience there is no use trying to build a revival on the ball 
room and a pack of cards, a demijohn, a case of beer or outlawed 
debts. Supposing this building should burn down, or fall down, 
and we should let the contract to an architect and you put the 
foundation on the old rubbish. You would say that he is bug- 
house. Listen to some tremendous facts; there are 178,000 
churches in the United States. There are 26,000,000 communi- 
cants in the churches, Catholics and Protestants, and there is 
room enough in the churches for 56,000,000 of our people. Now 
all you would need to do is for each one to save one a year and in 
three years we could save the United States for Jesus Christ. But 
after 1900 years of preaching the world is being born into sin 
nearly twenty to one faster than into the Kingdom of God. I 
think that it is down-right hypocrisy to pray for a thing that we 
are not willing to work for and prayers are worth no more than 
what you are willing to redeem in work. 

" 'The people had a mind to work.' Now we are in a cause that 
demands human labor. I say it reverently. Unless God can get 
human agents to do the work the work will not be done. God has 
put it up to you and to me. God could convert a man on top of 
the Alps with nobody within forty miles of him. But I don't 
believe that anybody has ever been converted that God has not 
used somebody to bring the message. We are in a cause that 
demands human labors. 

"If a thing is in the slightest degree desirable a large number 
laboring for the accomplishment will of necessity meet with re- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 209 

suits. The liquor traffic has $500,000,000 to fight virtue and 
sobriety and decency and everything that is noble. The money 
does not come from the local bunch, not from the Decatur brew- 
ery, but from the Liquor Dealers' Association. That is the crowd 
that you have got to fight. 

"If a thing is in the slightest degree desirable a large number 
of people working for its accomplishment will of necessity meet 
with results.' Well, that being true in damnable, hellish things, 
it is equally true in noble, great and inspiring things. There was 
a fellow named Peter and Cornelius was praying for light on 
some subject, perhaps about the divinity of Jesus, and he was 
praying and giving alms. And the Lord sent an angel to Corne- 
lius and said: 'Cornelius, thy prayers and alms have come up 
as a memorial before me' — by the way they keep tab in heaven on 
what you give as you pray; — and some of you old stingy loots, 
God won't hear your prayers unless you open your pocket book 
— thy prayers and alms come as a memorial ; 'and you send over 
to Joppa to the home of a tanner, and you will find a fellow named 
Peter, and he will tell you what you want to know/ Now why 
didn't God let the angel tell him? What is the use of sending 
the angel to Cornelius just to say : 'You send over to the home 
of a tanner, and he will tell you.' Why couldn't the angel just 
as well have told him ? That is not God's way of doing business. 
I am not buttinsky on the Lord's plans. He would have Corne- 
lius come into possession of that light through a fellow man. 
And wherever some fellow is groping in darkness God has some 
good man to send with the message and if you don't go that fellow 
may go to hell. 

"Be workers, not knockers. Let us be believers, not iconoclasts, 
helpers, not critics. There is a whole bunch of people that will 
wear out 55 pair of hold-backs to one pair of tugs. There is a 
bunch in the church that is riding the breeching all the time. No 
sooner does work begin than opposition arises. But emergencies 
in one case make expedients in another. War makes heroes and 
heroines, then war gave Grant and Dewey, and Schley a chance to 
show what kind of stuff they were made of. They were already 
made but the war gave them a chance to show the world what 



210 Life and Labors of 

they were made of, and they were not made of the kind of stuff 
that turns to water when they go up against a difficulty that 
brings out the best manhood and womanhood. 

"It is said of Michael Angelo that one time he stepped into a 
building upon the walls of which Raphael had placed some car- 
toons, and Angelo's practiced eye told him the cartoons were too 
large in proportion to the size of the building. Without offering a 
word of criticism he dipped the brush in the paint and painted upon 
the wall a cartoon the size of, in his judgment, the other should 
have been. 'Why/ somebody said, 'didn't you call attention to 
the difficulty?' 'Oh,' said Angelo, T criticise by creation and not 
by finding fault. Sisters, if any of you can preach better than 
I, why, buttinsky, and show me. Deliver the goods, express 
charges prepaid, for I am from Missouri. You get up here and 
try to do the stunt and you will get cold feet in two minutes. I 
am doing my best and if I can't do the best I would like to, I 
always do the best I can. 

" 'The people had a mind to work,' so if you can sing, sing ; if 
you can fiddle, fiddle a fiddle ; if you can toot a horn, toot a horn ; 
do what you can. The people had a mind to work. Do what you 
can. A working Christian will never have any doubt. You walk 
up to a man or a woman who is working for God and praying 
and living right, and you say, 'How do you do? Are you a 
Christian?' 'Yes, sir.' Go up to a good many fellows and say 
'How do you do, are you a Christian?' 'Well, I hope so, Mr. 
Sunday ; I am trying to be. Pray for me.' I suppose if you come 
up to them and say, 'Are you married ?' They would be trying to 
be. I tell you, go pay your debts and you can say : 'Yes, I know 
I am a Christian.' 'Stop lying about your neighbor.' A small 
boy in the front row gave a loud ha! ha! Mr. Sunday stopped 
and looked down at the youngster and said: "That boy knows. 
He has heard it at home." 

"I will give you a simple receipt ; make out a prayer list. If you 
haven't done it, do it. Write the names of fifteen or twenty people 
you would like to see saved. Call them up, meet them on the 
street; call them on the 'phone. Look around at the meetings 
and see if they are here. See them and tell them you are praying 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 21 1 

for them every day. I tell you they will flock into the Kingdom of 
God like doves in at a window. 

"I was down in a town in Iowa and made this suggestion to the 
ministers. After the meeting was closed I asked them and Doc- 
tor McClintock to write down the names of 47 persons, and they 
checked off 43. A Baptist minister had put down forty and 
checked off thirty-seven. Other ministers had done fully as well. 

"I knew a boy, not personally, but he was a friend of one of 
my friends. He had been attending the meetings and heard me 
tell about putting the names of people down that you would like 
to see saved. During* the revivals this little boy was taken sick 
and shortly after the meeting closed he died. After the funeral of 
this little boy the bed clothes were hung on the line to air and 
in under the sheets they found a piece of paper on which he had 
the names of 32 of his boy friends and companions and every 
one had a pencil mark after it. He never had said a word but 
before God had called him home he had the pleasure of seeing 32 
of his friends called into the Kingdom of heaven. 

"Take your prayer list and keep it where you can see it. You 
can pray with your eyes open just as well as you can with them 
closed. Pray for them three or four times a day. 

" 'The people had a mind to work.' God said : T will make 
coal, but if you want it in your homes to warm yourselves, to drive 
your locomotives and machines, you must go down and dig.' 
God says: T will make gold, but if you want a gold watch, go 
and dig gold and put it through the smelters and the assayers and 
the jewelers. All that/ God says, 'you will have to do, if you want 
a watch/ 

"God says, 'I will make black dirt that is worth $200 an acre 
around here, and make the sunshine and the rain, and I will make 
the seed germinate. But if you want that crop you will have to 
work and strive for it.' The Lord is ready and willing to do his 
part. 

"I was walking down Van Buren street in Chicago one day and 
a fellow came up behind me and said : 'Hello, Bill, where are yon 
going?' I said, 'no place in particular/ He said: 'Come and go 
over to the bank with me ; I want to go to my safety deposit vault.' 



212 Life and Labors of 

We went down to the bank to where the safety deposit vault was. 
Here he put in a key he had and then he put in another key that 
belonged to the bank so that neither he nor the bank could open it 
without the other being present. He opened the vault and took 
out a long box. 'Look here, Bill/ he said, and he reached down 
and pulled out a huge diamond, then he pulled out an emerald, 
then he picked up a sapphire, and said, 'Isn't that a beauty.' 
He took out a perfect sapphire from the box, and then a pigeon- 
blood ruby, and said: 'Look at that, it is worth $1,500; it is the 
most valuable stone in the world.' 

"He put the box back in the vault and finally said to me, 
'Bill have you got a safety deposit vault?' 'No,' I said. 'Well, 
why don't you get one?' 'What for? To keep my neckties?' 
'No/ 'Then what for?' 'To keep money in/ 'I haven't got 
money enough to buy a key-hole in one of those boxes.' We came 
out of the building and walked down the street and I took a cable 
car and started home and the last thing I heard him say was: 
'Get one of those safety deposit boxes in the Fidelity Trust 
Building/ 

"Where a man's treasure is there is his heart also. Many a fel- 
low today has his heart out on a 160 acre farm. Many a fellow 
spends more money on a few thoroughbred cattle than he does 
on his boys and girls. 

"I don't believe in fiction. I don't read it. I don't have time to. 
A man came around and asked me to read a book that he had. 
I told him that I did not have time. 'Well/ he said 'will you read 
a story in that book ?' And I consented to. He gave me the book 
and told me to read a certain story in it that he showed me. I 
read it and it was a story of a fellow who dreamed he went to 
heaven and asked for permission to come in. 

"The angel told him to bring them the most valuable thing 
on earth. 'I can do that/ he said, and then he went back to earth 
and got the most beautiful specimens of gold and then took his 
flight back to heaven and offered it to the angels. The angel 
said: 'No, we don't buy and sell gold in heaven. We have the 
streets paved with better gold than you could get.' He returned 
to the earth and secured some of the most precious stones it was 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 213 

possible to get and returned to heaven with them and when he 
met the angel he offered her the stones. She said : 'No, we don't 
wear stones in heaven; the city is made of precious stones, more 
precious than you could possibly get.' He returned to the earth 
and one day was walking along a stream when he saw a little child 
lying with her face toward the sky beneath a tree, sound asleep. 
Nearby he noticed a desperado on his knees praying and the tears 
rolling down his cheeks. The man rushed up and caught the 
tears as they dropped from the face of the desperado. With his 
hands full of tears he winged his flight back to heaven, and the 
angel said : 'Come in ; there is nothing as precious as the tears of 
a penitent sinner.' I tell you the most precious thing on earth 
is to be on the side with God. 

" 'And the people had a mind to work.' I read the other day of 
a girl who found so much joy in just praying that she prayed that 
God would take her to heaven and let her live there. She 
dreamed one night that she did go to heaven and she knocked on 
the door, and the angel said: 'Oh, it is you, is it, Mary? Come 
on in. You just got in by the skin of your teeth.' They started to 
walk around and she saw a beautiful crown and she said : 'Whose 
is that?' The angel says, 'That is the minister's.' 'Oh,' said 
Mary, 'Is that the minister's? How glad he will be to get it/ 
'He was never half appreciated down there,' said the angel. 
'Don't you remember how they grumbled and growled at him 
clown there ?' They walked on a little farther and came to another 
crown and Mary said : 'Whose is that ?' The angel said, 'That is 
Aunt Mary's crown.' 'Oh,' said Mary, 'Does she get that good 
a crown ? Is she the old wash woman that used to do our wash- 
ing?' 'Yes, the one who used to wash twenty four pieces for 
fifty cents, and they put in sheets, table cloths, and bed spreads 
and some of them had skirts with 95 yards of insertion on them. 
She earned every sou she got manicuring her finger nails over a 
washboard.' They went on a little further and came to another 
crown, just a plain crown. The angel said that was Mary's 
crown. Mary said she didn't want it; it was too plain. The 
angel said: 'It isn't what you want, it is what you get. You 
never saved a soul on earth.' She woke up and found it was a 



214 Life and Labors of 

dream and she said: 'I will work.' And she went out into the 
highways and along the hedges and into the houses of the poor 
and talked to the sinners and pulled them into the Kingdom of 
God. 

" 'And the people had a mind to work/ You are benefited 
according to your work. Everything we see is the result of work. 
They did not evolute. Work made our clothes. Work made our 
shoes. Everything we see is the result of work. Civilization 
comes from work. You can find as much Christianity and Amer- 
icanism in a dug-out on the plains as you can on Fifth avenue 
and in the log-cabins on the hills and on the mountain sides you 
can find character as lofty as the mountain peaks that surround 
the mountain homes. 

"Out from the plains came Oliver and the chilled steel plow. 
It came from work, work, work. And so with the locomotive 
with its steel rails and magnificent engine, with its seven-foot 
drive wheels which whips you over the land so that it looks like 
a meteor rushing across the sky. It all came from work. It did 
not evolute. So with electricity. After lying dead for two thou- 
sand years it was revived by that fertile brain of Galvani. Then 
the telegraph by Morse. He saw a steel thread stretched across 
the country and then a cable under the sea. I can go to the tele- 
graph office and send a message to a land that you never saw 
and get an answer before breakfast. It would not be surprising 
to read of a fellow who had invented a long cigar-shaped machine 
that you could crawl into and push a button and be in San 
Francisco two hours before you started. You need not laugh. 
There is three hours difference in the time of the two cities. 

"I would not be surprised if some fellow would invent a grapho- 
kisso-huggo — well, that is enough, so that a young fellow could 
stand in Decatur and hug and kiss his girl in Clinton with all the 
delightful sensations accompanying the aforesaid. 

"If you do anything in this world you will have to work. And 
the people had a mind to work, work, work. 

"Oliver Wendell Holmes says a man is like a 70-year old 
clock. God winds him up and the resurrecting angel brushes him 
up. Think of that day when the clocks are all wound up and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 215 

polished and the wheels are oiled and are ready to go on again. 
I can see him take out an old clock, wind him up, polish him and 
sand-paper him, oil him and start him going, and I can see the 
man walk up on a pulpit and say : 'Brothers, first, f oreordination ; 
second, predestination.' I recognize in him the Presbyterian min- 
ister. I can see another clock get up out of his grave and say: 
'Brethern and sisters-ah, as I was riding down the road by the 
creek-ah, I saw a snag out in the river-ah, and a turtle sitting 
on top of it. When he saw me he dived into the water-ah; and 
thereby proving Baptism is by immersion.' With God it doesn't 
make any difference. There is the Episcopalian with his formality 
and the Catholic, and the Lutheran and the Methodist. I can see 
all the clocks get out of their graves on that day and come up 
before God for their reward. 

" 'The people had a mind to work.' Strive to bring men and 
women to Jesus Christ." 



BACKSLIDING 

Thine own wickedness shall correct thee and 
thy backsliding shall reprove thee. Know 
therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bit- 
ter that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, 
and that my fear is not in thee. — Jer. 2:19. 

"If ever I was at a loss to know what to preach about I could 
settle upon some good text for backsliders. I know that I will 
not miss it far for it will apply to half or two-thirds of an audi- 
ence. And I always try to interest the largest number. 

"We speak of backsliding in such a slighting fashion that many 
think it has become an insignificant sin; one scarcely worthy of 
attention. But to my mind it is one of the worst and most hideous 
and God uses his strongest language about it to picture his dis- 
gust and loathing for this sin. 

"I have sometimes in imagination and in reality seen a ship as 
she backs away from the wharf and starts for lands you never 
saw. Bright faces leaning over the side of the vessel washed by 
the feathery foam. The smoke as it curls from the funnels is 



216 Life and Labors of 

wafted towards the land by gentle zephyrs. And those on the ves- 
sel were waving farewell and those on the wharf were shouting: 
'Good-bye. Bon voyage to you all.' All nature seemed to be 
interested in making the trip one of pleasure and of profit and of 
health. 

"But just beyond the harbor, just over the bar, the storm clouds 
thick advanced and became as dense as adamant. And the gentle 
zephyrs became hurricanes and the waters lifted into mountain 
waves, and the old ship rocked and trembled. She poked her nose 
into the waves and the old screw and propeller buzz, and she 
labors and she becomes like a thing of life. And the watchman 
cries out: 'Breakers ahead! Hard aport the helm!' Goes the 
command to the engineer. The old leviathan of the deep magnifi- 
cently replies to the touch, but it is too late. She strikes on the 
barely emerging reef and down she goes, and with the morrow 
the circling gulls tell the sad story. Oh, how our hearts ache 
when we read in the Associated Press about it ; how we groan in 
agony if some loved one went down in a watery grave. 

"But to me it is sadder when it is a picture of an immortal 
soul. I have seen men and women start out from some individual 
church or great campaign like this for the New Jerusalem. I 
have seen tears of joy trickle down the cheeks of the wife as she 
sees that husband press forward that she has prayed for. I have 
seen mothers thank God and throw their arms around boys who 
themselves were gray-haired, as they have staggered into the 
Kingdom of God. A revival — then earth-born clouds arose, 
and they drifted from God and hope and the church. 

"We have all sorts and kinds of backsliders for all sorts and 
kinds of reasons. I sincerely regret the necessity forced upon me 
by the way that people live to make necessary a sermon along this 
line. But I will not sacrifice what I know to be the truth for the 
sake of expediency. I detest a good-for-nothing, two-by-four 
trimmer anywhere, in politics, in business, and above all places 
in the church. There are old trimmers that belong to the Devil's 
gang who go about with a long face. I want a man to be the 
same if called out of bed at midnight as he would be on Sunday 
morning. But they came to the church of God. There is a care- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 217 

less backslider. You never start a revival but that sort of people, 
you know, will be among the first to repent— and a hundred to one 
the first to turn turtle and deny the faith they profess to believe. 
It is a sort of a ground-hog case. 

"With the warm rays of the spring sunshine and the showers 
out into the world the ground-hog comes from the winter's hiber- 
nating, and feeds on the tender, succulent vegetation of spring, 
and he gourmandizes until the cold blast of December blows, and 
then he returns to hibernate upon the summer's fat. When the 
warm sun of righteousness becomes concentrated on a community 
men take to prayer and to reading their Bibles ; go to paying their 
debts, leaving other men's wives alone; making ball room cos- 
tumes into crazy quilts and throwing away the deck of cards. 
When the warm rays of the sun of righteousness concentrates on 
men and women, then they will come. Yes, and many a time they 
will be back again, denying the faith that they profess to believe, 
and they go back to the grog shop, and the brothel, and the 
gambling den as soon as the revival is over. I sometimes wonder 
what God is going to do with some of them. A good deal like the 
Irishman who went to the priest and confessed that he had com- 
mitted murder. The Irishman and the Jew were out fishing one 
day and got to discussing religion and finally left off the dis — 
and of course Pat stood up for the Catholic church and the 
Jew stood up for the Pentateuch. In the discussion they came to 
a scuffle and Pat was the stronger and he grabbed the Jew and 
they over-turned the boat and Pat shoved the Jew under the 
water and brought 'him up panting and gasping for breath. 

" 'Now, will you be a good Catholic ?' 'No,' shouted the Jew. 
Down he goes under the water, and Pat holds him longer this 
time and brings him up. 'Now will you be a good Catholic?' 
'Yes/ Down Pat shoves him again and holds him until he is 
dead. 'But, Pat,' remonstrated the priest, 'when he said he would 
be a good Catholic, why did you kill him?' 'Sure your riverance, 
I knew him too well, and I thought I would make sure of him 
while I had him.' 

"There is a large number of that crowd that have been gathered 
into the church, and it would be a god-send if God would visit 



218 Life and Labors of 

them with typhoid, Asiatic or yellow fever, and take the whole 
bunch to glory while yet in the Kingdom of Grace before they 
had a chance to backslide. 

"I think that will stand the test of all our varied theologies. 
Do something to keep them there. Like on a railroad strike — the 
engineers were all on a strike and they had everybody they could 
get to take their places. They had some stationary engineers. 
An Irishman was given a job and told to run an engine into a 
roundhouse. He started the engine all right but could not stop 
and when he reversed it, it made back for the turn table. After 
running in and out twice in this way some one shouted to him: 
'Why don't you stop the engine when it is in the round house?' 
Pat yelled back : 'Why in the divil don't you shut the door when 
I have her in there?' 

"I don't know how God is going to get some in if he don't. I 
don't want to butt into God's business. These are just a few sug- 
gestions to him. Read the Pentateuch or Exodus and see if you 
don't lose patience with the Jews about ten times in every hour. 
They grumble and growl until I wonder that God Almighty did 
not kill them. He was doing all he could to help them. Just 
watch yourself — keep your eye peeled on that Methodist, that 
Presbyterian, that Congregationalist, that nibble here and there. 
People read some good-for-nothing novel and let the Bible mildew 
on the center table. The pack of cards becomes greasy from use 
while the Bible is just a show? You never open it save when a 
baby is born or there is a death and you want to keep up the fam- 
ily records. 

"Take the club — we are clubbed to death in our time. Litera- 
ries, Christian culture business, has too big a place in the world, 
and God Almighty is not given a chance in the world. Just do 
the Lord's work and honor him and do not make the church play 
a second fiddle, jack-rabbit business to any club. But we head the 
Lord's work in and lock the switch and give the devil the main 
line. I never understood why God's sheep would leave God's 
clover and go into the back yards and chew rags with the billy- 
goats. Whenever I see a church member going to a ten-cent leg- 
show or lining up at some little nickel hole-in-the-wall, you may 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 219 

be sheep but you have the appetite of the goat if you go to places 
like that. Too many are like the fellow who said that he had 
served God off and on for forty years. That is why the world 
is not advancing for God. It is like a boy who was asked if he 
had been converted, and he thought that they said vaccinated, and 
he said, 'yes, but it never took.' And so people live just the 
same. There is no dissimilarity in their lives. God has never 
been able to use them. 

"There is another class in the church — they interest me more. 
They started soberly and thoughtfully — determinedly, and ex- 
pected to go all the way, but they were not careful enough. They 
did not put on the whole armor of God and they became vulnerable 
to the attacks of the Devil. He shot them with an arrow and they 
fell by the wayside. They did not turn their backs to every known . 
sin and live for Jesus. I had a friend that was preaching in a 
southern city and he asked how many who were backsliders were 
men enough to acknowledge it. About 40 people arose and in 
that mute way, shamefacedly acknowledged and sat down and he 
said : T wish that you would be more specific/ 'What caused you 
to leave the gospel train and why did you not get back ?' And by 
and by one after another — about a dozen — arose and made ac- 
knowledgments like this; one man said: 'Well, when I kept 
my store open on the Sabbath a little while' — (a man that will 
keep his store open on Sunday is an anarchist: he does not care 
for the law of God or man. A man cannot have one sou of my 
money that will keep open on Sunday.) 

"Like a merchant that I went to in Chicago. I said, T like to 
trade with you; I get good things and I think I get full weight. 
But you keep open on Sunday and I have made it a rule that I 
won't buy one dollar's worth from a man that keeps his store open 
on Sunday. I know that you won't go into bankruptcy because 
you lose my patronage, but I want you to understand my position.' 
Then I began trading with a Catholic, and that merchant went 
around and got other merchants to close on Sunday. 

"I never saw a card-playing, dancing or theater-going, whisky 
drinking church member that was worth three hoops this side of 
Havana or Peoria. I am the father of a daughter that I love with 



220 Life and Labors of 

all my heart. I would die for Helen this minute. But if Helen 
had just sense to dance and eat fudges and read novels and sing 
rag-time f ol-de-rol and manicure her nails, and pencil her eyebrows 
and bang her hair and try to squeeze a number four foot into a 
number two shoe and to squeeze on a N P 22 R. G. when she 
ought to have a number 28, and go round with her eyes looking 
like two buck-eyes in a bowl of clabber, with a little kangaroo 
skirt on— do you know what I would do with her? I would chas- 
tise her. I want to say this to you, as long as my children sit 
down and stick their feet under my table and eat the food that 
the sweat of their pa's brow earns for them; as long as I buy the 
garments to clothe them and furnish the beds in which they sleep 
— I will tell you that W. A. Sunday's kids have got to mind him. I 
would say to her, 'Helen, put on your hat and coat/ and I would 
take her over to the West Side to an old hook-nosed French 
dancing master and say: 'Hello, Frenchy; my name is W. A. 
Sunday, and this is my daughter. And I have tried to raise her to 
be of some account in the world. She is a flat fizzle in her head, 
and if you can fix her feet, go at her. I want some good of her 
feet and legs if nothing else/ 

"I want to remind you that religion is not for money, business, 
pleasure or compliment; it is for God, first, last and always. 
Think before you step. Carefully consider it before you take it 
and never defeat and always live for God and for his truth. 

"Peter was a backslider, but he came back to Jesus Christ and 
was a great preacher of the Word of God. Judas was a back- 
slider, and he went out and killed himself and left his bones out 
there on the potter's field a monument to folly and foolishness. 

"In business life there are crises and hard times, and you may 
overdraw the account in the bank. But not if the banker knows 
it. God don't turn you down and shove you back into the world. 
He don't do that, sinners. Thieves, prostitutes, no matter who 
you are, or how you creep or crawl in ; He don't care who you are, 
He don't turn lives out in the dark. 

"I tell you with the authority of God, that God hears you when 
you pray. I tell you no man or woman wants to be untrue. If 
you are a backslider, get right with God, pray and he will hear 
you. Nobody has to apologize as an untrue man or woman. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 221 

"I admire a man who lives up to his highest ideals of life? If 
I know he is living up to those ideals, whether they are right or 
wrong, then if they are wrong I will work with him and try to 
convince him of his error and lead him into right doing. If he is 
living up to his highest ideals of life, I will admire him and 
respect him, although those ideals may be different from mine. 

"At the beginning of the civil war Robert E. Lee said to Scott : 
'Although I am in the Union army if the state of Virginia is for 
secession, I must throw in my lot with my mother-state and I will 
bid the Union Army farewell/ Robert E. Lee followed that 
cause which was and became the lost cause. I never heard a 
man say a mean, or contemptible or derogatory thing against 
Robert E. Lee or Stonewall Jackson. I have been in the south 
for months at a time, traveled all over it, and I never heard a man 
say a mean or contemptible thing against Grant or Lincoln. 

"Robert E. Lee stood by and saw his cause fall. He stood by 
and watched it dissolve and disappear in the red, white and blue 
flag. He stood by and watched the government for which he 
fought to establish broken and dismantled like a wreck. There he 
was with poverty facing him. Arlington had been confiscated by 
the government. In that awful hour of trial that contemptible 
damnable octopus of hell, the Louisiana Lottery, offered him the 
presidency of its institution. He said : 'Gentlemen, I don't under- 
stand the lottery business.' They said, 'General, all we want is 
your name. You let us use your name and your salary will be ten 
thousand a year. We will run the business/ 

"Robert E. Lee arose and buttoned that thin grey coat across his 
shriveled breast, looked squarely in the eyes of the men and 
said: 'Gentlemen, my good name and good reputation is all that 
I have left now, and they are not for sale. You can't buy Robert 
E. Lee's name.' He went south and for $83 a month taught 
young men of the south higher principles and methods. I admire 
a true man. I like to see a man that money can't buy. I despise 
a man who will pretend to be a church member and sell himself 
to the Devil. 

"I know a fellow who has three sons who entered the civil war 
and he used to brag that he had given three sons to the country 



222 Life and Labors of 

and all the time that he was boasting and bragging he had a 
powder magazine across the line and was selling powder to the 
enemy. Many a fellow today professes to be a Christian and 
then goes out and votes the whisky ticket. I like to see men and 
women that you can't buy. You vote for the whisky gang and the 
Devil and against the church and the school and the home and 
virtue and decency and all that is noble and grand in this old 
world. 

"I like to see a man that you can't buy. Thank God that there 
are some men whom you can't buy with all the millions of the 
millionaires. You can't buy them for they are not for sale. 

"Here a traveling man comes to Decatur and calls on a firm 
that has bought his goods for many years and never lost a dollar 
in his life. He takes his order and starts out down the street. 
He goes down the street a little ways and meets a man just start- 
ing in business and wants to buy some of his goods, would like to 
place an order with him. 

"He looks him tip in Bradstreet and finds his rating is low. 
He goes back to his friend and says : 'Say, what about so and so? 
He is just starting in business and he wants to place an order 
with me? "He is rated low in Bradstreet and Dun's. What is 
your advice about selling him goods ?' The fellow says, 'You sell 
him all the goods he wants ; he is as good as gold, and his name 
is as good as a government bond and you run no risk on him.' 

"The traveling man walks down the street and meets another 
man that would like to place an order with him for a large amount 
of goods. He looks him up in Dun and Bradstreet and finds 
him rated high. He goes back and asks the merchant how about 
this fellow? 'What is your advice about selling him goods?' 
The merchant takes him back in his private office and says : 'You 
keep your eyes skinned on that fellow. He fails about every six 
years, and his sixth year since the last failing will be about the 
first of March.' 

"Which would you rather be, rated high in Dun and Brad- 
street and not rated very high in the estimation of other mer- 
chants? Or rated low in Dun and Bradstreet and have the high- 
est respect and honor among the merchants? 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 223 

"Let me ask you would you rather be rated high on the book 
of God and have no rating in this old world ? 

"And say, do you want to know the solution to the most per- 
plexing question of the 20th century ? 

"It was the same in the first century. How can we win this 
old sin-cursed, whisky-soaked, gambling, card-playing, harlot- 
ridden damnable earth for Jesus Christ ? I will tell you. We will 
do it when the members of the church won't lie or sell out to the 
Devil and prove false to Christ. 

'I can imagine a man being untrue to his business. I can 
imagine a man being untrue to his lodge. I can imagine a man 
being untrue to his wife, an unthinkable thing — if it isn't it ought 
to be — but untrue to God. He does promise to be true to him and 
stand by him. When he loses faith in God he loses heaven, happi- 
ness and home. That is what it means to be a backslider. 

"I have reached my hand down in the slimy part of the world 
to help hundreds and thousands back into the communion of Jesus 
Christ and turn friends of the Devil. I have helped to pick up many 
a drunken puking sot, and have given him assistance to return 
to his Maker. I have helped thousands renew their vows. I have 
never refused to help any one, and never will. I believe there are 
multitudes of such here that I would be glad to save, and God 
knows I would be glad to help them. 

"Every beer and champagne drinking, card-playing and Sunday 
desecrating church member says: 'I would rather be rated high 
on the books of Dun and Bradstreet' 'But I tell you I want to 
stand high on God's book, stand high with the Lord, whatever 
Dun and Bradstreet say. 

"I say to a man : 'Are you a member of a secret order?' 'Yes.' 
'A Mason?' 'Yes.' 'A Shriner?' 'Yes.' 'Have you been raised 
from a dead level to a perpendicular?' 'Yes.' 'Are you an Odd 
Fellow?' 'Yes.' 'Do you know the story of David and Jonathan 
and the Good Samaritan?' 'Yes, and practice it.' 'Are you a 
K. of P?' 'Yes/ 'Are you loyal to the creed of the society?' 
'Yes. Go down in my pocket and share my last dollar with a 
needy brother.' 'Are you married ?' 'Yes,' 'True to your wife?' 
'Yes.' 'Would you stand up and let a militia fire a volley of shots 



224 Life and Labors of 

at you before you would be untrue to your wife?' 'Yes.' 'Good.' 

"I like to see a man that is true to his wife. I like to see a 
man that is true to his lodge. I like to see a man that is true in 
business dealings. But what about this man that is true to his 
lodge, true in business and true to his wife? He comes into 
church and prays and sits at the communion table and partakes of 
the bread symbolical of His body, and the wine symbolical of the 
blood of Jesus Christ, and he walks out and inside of forty-eight 
hours he is lined up in front of some bar room pouring beer and 
wine down his gullet, and stands there telling dirty, smutty stories. 
Untrue to Jesus Christ, the source of truth. True to his business, 
true to his lodge, true to his wife, but a liar. That is what a back- 
slider is who has been untrue to God ; a man who has broken his 
word ; a man who goes back on God. It means a man or woman 
who denies the Lord. That is what a man is who breaks his 
vows, a liar. 

"I go to a man and say: 'Look here, they tell me you are an old 
thief ; when you are around they have to watch you all the time ; 
is that true ?' T suppose so, Mr. Sunday, I am only just human ; 
don't put the standard too high/ I go to a man and say : 'Look 
here, they tell me you are an old libertine, a crusher of virtue and 
character; is that so?' T suppose so, Mr. Sunday; I am only just 
human ; don't put the standard too high.' 

"Is that the way a man talks? Not much. You go to a man 
and say: 'They tell me you don't pray; they say you are a lib- 
ertine or a thief;' and you know what he will do. I'll tell you 
what he will do ; he will put up his hands and want to fight and 
say: 'I won't allow any man to say anything against my name 
and character/ 

"But you go to a man and say : 'They tell me you are an old 
Methodist backslider, or an Episcopal backslider, or a Presbyte- 
rian backslider, or a Baptist backslider; is that so?' He says: 
'I suppose so, Brother Sunday, but I am just human; don't put 
the standard too high for poor struggling humanity.' That is 
what it means to be a backslider. 

"True men and women. I like to see a true woman. God 
Almighty cut out the same path for both men and women, but 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 225 

man cut out one for himself that reached way down here, and 
man created a place for the woman that stood up there. Some 
such dialogue as this has been going on for hundreds of years 
between man and wife. 

"She leans out and says: 'Where are you going?' 'None of 
your blank business. I am a man/ 'Well, can't I go with you?' 
'No, that is no place for you; no, you can't go with me.' 'How 
long do you think you will be gone ?' 'None of your business.' 

"I tell you, friends, it don't make any difference to God whether 
you wear a plug hat or hair pins. He set the same standard for 
both of you. If a man goes about the street spitting tobacco on 
the sidewalk, why should he cuss his wife if she should do the 
same thing? Suppose she should go around cussing and swearing 
in the house, what would he do? I'll tell you what he would 
do ; he would go sneaking up to the court house and get a divorce. 
God never gave any man the liberty to set up a standard for the 
women. 

"Untrue to Jesus Christ. I like to see a true woman. Did you 
ever hear the beautiful story of Panthea? Whose beauty of face 
and form was celebrated all over the kingdom. Cyrus had 
learned of her beauty and wanted her for his harem. He sent 
his servants down to see her laden with fabulous sums of money 
and gold. 

The servants laid the gold before her feet, but she only refused 
them. The servants returned to Cyrus, and when he found that 
he had failed, he sent his servants a second time with more gold 
and jewels. She refused him the second time. 

"The third time Cyrus went himself and pleaded with her to 
become his wife and go to his harem. She only spurned his 
offers. He added fabulous sums to the already large amounts 
of money he offered her. Cyrus returned in despair but not to 
give up hope. 

"He sent for her husband, and gave him charge of the chariots 
and sent him to war. He put him where he would be in front of 
the battle where he hoped that he might be wounded, if not 
killed. Panthea lingered nearby until at last word was brought 
to her that her husband lay wounded upon the battlefield. She 

15 



226 Life and Labors of 

immediately started forward with a retinue of servants following 
her. As she ran she looked into the faces of the dying and the 
dead, and she would cry out: 'Oh, husband! oh, husband! Pan- 
thea calls thee !' 

"Away in the distance she heard a faint response, and hurried 
to him. As she stepped beside him whose name she bore, a faint 
smile played over her features. She fell to the ground beside 
him, and his lips met hers in a loving embrace, and the lamp of 
life flickered and went out. 

"At her command they bore his body to the banks of a stream, 
and while the servants were digging his grave Panthea sat on the 
hillside. Cyrus had heard her husband had fallen in battle, and 
with a fiendish smile he said : 'Ha ! ha ! I will have her now for 
my harem. Now I will humble her pride.' 

"He got on his camel and raced across the battle field like a 
ship in a storm. Panthea looked and saw him coming and her 
face turned ashen pale and she cried : 'Oh, husband ! oh, hus- 
band !' But his ears were deaf. How quick he would have leaped 
to her side had he but have been able. 

" 'Oh, husband !' she cried, 'he shall not have me. I was true 
to you in life and I will be true to you in death.' So she un- 
sheathed her poniard and drove it into her heart and fell across 
his body. 

"When Cyrus came up he dismounted and removed his turban. 
And when he saw her lying by the side of her husband he said : 
'Thank God, I have found one woman a true and loyal wife, that 
my money could not buy.' 

"When I was in the Y. M. C. A., in Chicago, a fellow came 
to me one night and asked me if he could see the secretary. I 
told him I was one of them and asked him what I could do for 
him. He said that he was down and out and had drifted away 
from God and wanted to return. I talked to him awhile, and the 
next day I got him a job in a boot and shoe store. 

"One day a fellow came in and said to me : 'You know the fel- 
low you helped one time?' I said, 'Yes.' 'Well,' he said; 'he is 
down on LaSalle street in a gambling joint playing a faro bank.' 

"I put on my hat and went down there. I turned into an alley 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 227 

and went up a flight of stairs and rapped on the door. A big 
colored fellow opened the door. He was an ex-prize fighter, and 
they used him for the bouncer. 

"I went in and looked all around, and finally I saw my friend 
sitting at a table playing a faro bank. I heard him say : 'I cap the 
queen/ and he drew a ten spot and won $85.00. He got up and 
walked up to the bar and called for some wine and a seltzer. I 
went up to him and said : 'What are you doing here ?' He turned 
white and looked surprised. He ran his hand down in his pocket 
and pulled out $145 and handed it to me and said: 'Here take it 
quick.' I said: 'I don't want your money.' 

"He begged me to let him go and he would never bother me 
again. I said : 'No ; I didn't come in here for that purpose.' I 
had his wife and children over at my house, keeping them, and I 
finally got him to come and go over there with me. It was 1 
o'clock when I got him out of there. I let my reputation stand to 
save his and bring him to God. 

"After I got him straightened out again he got a job as a travel- 
ing man at a salary of $5,000 a year. That was the last I saw of 
him for a long time. About two years afterward I received a 
telephone message from the police officer one day to come up 
there. I went over and asked what they wanted with me. He 
said a friend of mine wanted to see me. He went out and brought 
the fellow in. I said : 'Hello, Bill, what is the matter now ?' He 
said : 'I have been sentenced to Joliet for an indeterminate period.' 
That is from one to fourteen years. 'What caused all that,' I 
asked. He said : 'I got in with a gang that tried to rob a jewelry 
store, and when they made their getaway I got caught.' He 
wanted me to help him. There he was. He would not listen to 
me and today he is in Joliet. 



228 Life and Labors of 



Lord, is it /f— Matthew 26:22. 

"God created man and placed him in the garden of Eden, and 
gave the explicit command, and man disobeyed, with the full pen- 
alty, for God said : 'In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt 
surely die.' 

"But no sooner did man sin than God gave the promise that 
the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head. And in 
the fullness of time Jesus Christ came into the world in the fulfill- 
ment of that promise. He spoke as nobody ever spoke. He 
opened the eyes of the blind, and stilled the tempest, and fed the 
multitudes, and proved by His miracles that He was the Son of 
God. But no matter what He said the Jews spurned Him and 
their enmity and hatred culminated in the crucifixion. But before 
that sad tragedy was enacted some incidents occurred which I 
want to speak of, for your help and inspiration. 

"Jesus said to his disciples, 'Go into yonder town and you will 
find a place where two ways meet ; and you will find a colt tied ; 
bring it to me, and if any one asks: 'Why?' say that 'The Master 
has need of him.' 

"And the disciples went into the town and found the place and 
I can imagine one man said : 'Hey, there ; what are you going to 
do?' And I can hear them say, 'The Master hath need of him,' 
and they came out to Jesus and He rode into Jerusalem ; and the 
people shouted 'Hosanna,' and their vociferations rolled down the 
street like a simoom of the desert. 

"You would imagine that they were going to crown Him king. 
Not they. He said to His disciples : 'You go on and you will find 
a man that is bearing a pitcher of water, and you follow him into 
a room and there prepare for my supper.' 

"And at the supper table that night Peter noticed that Jesus 
looked sad and troubled, and he turned to John and said : 'John, 
you ask him what is the matter.' John said: 'Master, what is 
the matter?' 'Why,' Jesus said, 'one of you shall betray me.' 
And John said, 'Lord, is it I?' And Peter said, 'Lord, is it I?' 
And Judas said, 'Lord, is it I?' Jesus said, Tt is he to whom I 
give the sop when I dip it in the dish.' And so saying He dipped 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 229 

it into the dish and handed it to that old arch-traitor and said, 
'What thou doest, do quickly.' Judas pricked to the heart, went 
out — Judas was treasurer, and the disciples thought Jesus had 
reference to some commodity which he wished to purchase for 
the morrow, little dreaming that he would betray Jesus. 

"And after they had sung a hymn they went out across the 
Brook Kedron, and He entered into Gethsemane, which brings 
me to my subject. I want you to notice these groups for they 
represent not luck nor chance. We have no record that any kind 
in any group desired to change his condition. Jesus entered the 
garden and put one group here and one group there, and the 
Bible says he himself went a stone's throw, say 75 or a 100 yards. 
One group here, another group there, Jesus over yonder. Notice 
the position. One group near the edge — they would only have 
to take a few steps to carry them across the brook over into the 
world where Judas was. I am sorry to say it (the truth is not 
always pleasant) that that group is analogous to the large per 
cent of people in the average church today. If you doubt, go 
ask the deacon and the elder and the steward, and the preacher, 
and consult the church records, and you will know. The church 
record will show you that they joined the church at such a time, 
but they live 'good Lord, good Devil' sort of milk and cider, chalk 
and vinegar lives, a useless proposition to the church and to the 
world in which they are. They amount to nothing as a spiritual 
force. They go to church and have a kind regard for religion, 
but as for a firm grip on God, and enthusiasm, cheerful spirit of 
self-denial, and willingness to strike hard, staggering blows 
against hell and damnation, and iniquity, they are flat failures in 
the church of God. Then I would get close enough to the fire to 
get thawed out, or I would get out of the church. So many are 
perfectly useless. 

"The nearer the relationship the stronger the tie of obligation. 
I owe to Mrs. Sunday and my children what I owe to no other 
woman and children on God's dirt. But I owe to God much 
because I am a child of God by faith in Jesus Christ. I owe to 
God and the church that which I don't owe to any other being 
on the face of the earth. The nearer the relationship the greater 



230 Life and Labors of 

the provocation. I could do in one act what would cause my chil- 
dren to hang their heads in shame. It would not put a tear in 
your eye because you are not related to me. It would put a smile 
on the face of some. Then I believe that the way some people live 
will bring tears to the eyes of Jesus. 

"I love to see a man that never trims his sail to catch the pass- 
ing breeze of popularity. You cannot live as you please. The 
higher up you climb the more conspicuous you are. The com- 
munity has a right to expect the best in you. 

"A woman went to Doctor Curtiss at Lincoln, Neb., and said: 
'Will you tell me why I cannot win my husband to Christ?' He 
said: 'Yes, you cannot win anybody to Christ the way that you 
live.' She was a good sensible woman and she thanked him and 
said: 'Will you pray that I may be able to win him to Jesus?' 
She went home at noon and her husband and son came home, and 
after dinner she asked them to stay a little while and she said : 'I 
never before realized why I could not win you to Christ. I have 
not been right — Let us pray together.' 

"And she got down on her knees and prayed, and all that she 
could say was 'O God ! O God !' Later on husband and son came 
into the church. And when she said, 'Why was it that you did 
not come before ?' Her husband said, 'Well, I will tell you. You 
used to ask me to go to church and I would go, and to prayer 
meetings and I went — and to revivals, and I would go. And I 
would ask you to go to a card party, and you would go, and I 
would ask you to go to a theater and you would go, or to a ball, 
and you would go. I went where you went and you went where 
I went. And what was the difference between us? I was just 
as good as you were/ And I will tell you, you will never win 
men and women on God's dirt until you live as you ought to live. 
I love to see people as loyal to God as Speaker Lenfall was to 
the constitution. When he was commanded to dissolve parliament 
he said : 'I have no eyes to see, nor ears to hear, or lips or tongue 
to speak, but as the constitution is pleased to direct me.' 

"You let men live in business, women in the home and society, 
and do what God's Word commands them to do, and you will 
see the greatest tidal wave of redemption that Illinois has wit- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 231 

nessed since admitted to the Union, or, since God made this black 
dirt. Never will you do it until the church comes to live and 
people live as they should live. 

"I love to see people as loyal as William of Orange of the Neth- 
erlands. Spain sent against him the flower of her armies, and 
offered him fabulous sums to surrender. And then promised to 
place him in line of Spanish succession to the throne, and permis- 
sion to name his own terms; and William of Orange sent back 
these words — which have become embalmed in the hearts and 
the memory of the people of Holland: 'Not for wife, nor chil- 
dren, nor lands, nor life, would I mix in my cup one drop of 
the poison of treason.' No wonder that when he fell, that little 
children stopped playing and went to weeping. The world needs 
loyalty like that for God, and God's truth. 

" 'Lord, is it I ?' 

"One group right here near the edge of the world. Another 
here, and Jesus over yonder. Different in size — come and look 
here ; one group had 8, one group 3, and 1. The largest over near 
the world. You will find more church members near the world 
than you will find near the Bible. Closer to the theater, to the 
novel, and to the card party, than to the Word of God. Farther 
from the Lord is the largest group, and nearest the world. The 
most glorious exploits don't always furnish the clearest insight 
into life. 

"Come with me a minute ; Daniel Webster, when asked, 'what 
are you going to be when you grow up,' replied: T am going 
to be a lawyer.' 'That profession is over-run.' 'Yes; but there 
is plenty of room at the top.' So the nearer you get to Jesus the 
more elbow room you will have and the less of a crowd there 
will be. The crowd is less around the prayer meeting and the 
family altar than around the card party, or the theater. 

"Let me tell you something. Do you realize what it is to be 
lost? I lose all faith and respect for such people. Lord, is it I? 

"You tell me how much you pray, you tell me how much you 
read the Bible, you tell me how much you give and do for the 
cause of Christ, and I will tell you what figure you stand near 011 
the religious thermometer. You just let the minister ask some 



232 Life and Labors of 

member of the prayer meeting to lead in prayer. There are men 
right here looking into my face that the preacher wouldn't any 
more think of asking to lead in prayer than he would of going 
down to the butcher shop and asking the butcher to cut off his 
right arm. Jesus didn't ask that crowd. 

" 'Sit ye here.' We are here for different duties. How many 
church people never do anything? There is a lot of them that 
are nothing but a bunch of bench warmers. They come to church 
but they never do anything. They never sing, they never pray, 
and they never do one thing to help to bring people to Jesus Christ. 
Never go to prayer meeting, and never go to Sunday School. 

" 'Watch and pray.' In the church of which I am a member 
in Chicago it is hard to state, but it is true, that there are some 
people up there that the preacher wouldn't think of asking to 
pray. 'Mr. K. will you lead us in prayer?' He will pray, but he 
will skin you a plenty if you have any business dealings with him. 
He has got a whisky bottle on the sideboard, and beer in the cel- 
lar; and he has a deck of cards on the center table. He has got 
a whisky-soaked son. I tell you many a man when he makes his 
will might just as well will his property to the saloon people, the 
brewer, the harlot, and the black-leg gambler, as to will it to his 
boy, for it won't be long until the saloon keeper, the brewer, the 
harlot, and the gambler will get all the money that he has piled 
up. He might as well save trouble by willing it to that bunch 
as to will it to his whisky-soaked boy. Think of saving all of your 
earthly earnings for a lifetime and then will it to a boy who will 
spend it on prostitutes, gamblers and fast horses. 

" 'Lord, is it I?' 

"There is a difference in our duties. 'Sit ye here,' and 'watch 
and pray.' We have a lot of members in the church whom I never 
see at a prayer meeting. I have been a member of the church 
going on twenty years, and there are lots of people I haven't seen 
darken the prayer meeting doors in all those years. 

" 'Well,' he will say, T could not come.' You can come here 
every night through the slush and snow to hear me. The reason 
is a lack of interest. There is no lack of interest here. I tell you, 
some of you preachers had better take a good look now at some 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 233 

of the people whom you see in this audience who belong to your 
church because you will never see them in a house of God after 
these revivals close. 

'"Lord, is it I?' 

"There are different duties for us to do. What Jesus had to do 
was to bear the sin of this old world. I remember the story of 
Christ bearing the cross to the mount. I see Him going, bearing 
the cross. I see Him stagger and fall; He gets up, picks up the 
cross, and starts out again. He goes a little way and staggers and 
falls again. 

"An old colored fellow by the name of Simon came along, 
helped Jesus with the cross, and helped carry it to the mount. 
When they got to the mount they dropped it in the hole with a 
chug. They then put Jesus on the cross between the two male- 
factors. Then cried Jesus — 'I thirst/ and an old Jew took a 
sponge, and dipped it in vinegar and put it to His mouth. Jesus 
cried out: 'My God, hast thou forsaken me?' The archangel 
looked down upon Him and cried: 'What can I do for thee? 
If thou needest help I will come down to thee.' But no reply. 
Again the angel cried : 'If thou needest help wave thy right hand 
and I will come to the rescue.' Jesus raised His head and said: 
'Peace, peace, peace.' 

"And it was made through His death on the cross. I don't 
know anybody that needs religion more than the church mem- 
bers. I am doing all I can. It just simply takes every drop of 
energy I have got. 

" 'Lord, is it I ?' 

"How many are like the disciples were that go with Him a lit- 
tle ways and then forsake Him? How many people will say: 
'Not my will but thine be done?' They will say, 'Not my will 
but — ' and right there they shut off the steam. They will say, 
'Not my will' — and turn off the light. They will say, 'Not my 
will, but—' and strike out. They will say, 'Not my will, but — ' ; 
here they hang up the receiver. They will say, 'Not my will, 
but — ' and head in on the side track. 

"It costs too much to say, 'Thy will be done.' It costs too 
much. Yet those four words would cause you to go home, burn 



234 Life and Labors of 

up the cards you have, take the beer out of the cellar and smash 
the bottles and let the beer run in the gutter. It will cause you to 
write somebody a letter and say you lied about them and talked 
about them. It will cause you to go home and start a family 
altar and then gather your family around you and pray. It might 
cost you a few votes at the next election, just those four words. 
They mean that you could not vote for that damnable whisky- 
soaked lot that you will get a chance at at the next spring elec- 
tion. 

"You can't keep your name on the church record and stand for 
that dirty business. You can't stand for that business and keep 
your manhood five minutes. Will you stand for Jesus Christ to 
the last ditch ? 

"'Lord, is it I?' 

"Here, I know a fellow in India. One day his little boy came 
running up to him and said: 'Papa, can I go with you?' His 
father said, 'Yes, come on.' The father picked up an ax and 
with the boy and a friend started to the woods to cut down some 
trees. While the father was cutting down a huge tree the boy 
wandered away from his side and over to the lagoon. While the 
father was sitting on the tree that he had just cut down, the lit- 
tle boy came running up and said, 'Father, can I wade in the 
lagoon?' 'Yes, my boy,' said the father,' but be careful and 
don't get out where it is deep.' He went back to the lagoon and 
started to wade around. After he had been gone a few minutes 
his father heard him cry : 'Hurry, papa ; hurry, papa.' He stop- 
ped to listen and again he heard the cry, 'Hurry, papa; hurry, 
papa ;' and grabbing his ax, he started on a run towards the la- 
goon. When he reached the lagoon he heard the boy say, 'Hurry, 
papa; hurry, papa/ 

"The sight that met the father's eyes was terrifying. He saw 
the boy in the stream being borne away by a huge alligator which 
had just woke up from his winter's sleep, and was lean and hun- 
gry. The father grasped the ax and started out in the water to 
the boy, but the alligator switched his tail making foam in the 
water, brushed the father away and crushed the boy to death. 

"He went away and got some friends and came back to kill 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 235 

the alligator. They hunted around for the alligator and the boy, 
and all he carried back to his heart-broken mother was a hand- 
ful of crushed bones. 

"Friends, when I heard that story I could not sleep. And when 
I thought what if it had been one of my own children, I could not 
eat. But I would rather see one of my children crushed in the 
jaws of an alligator, dearly as I love them, than have them borne 
away on a tidal wave of intemperance and adultery. I tell you, 
your boys and girls and mine are caught in the maelstrom of this 
world, and the church of Jesus Christ is sitting on the bank, play- 
ing and trifling. 

"My God, let us go out in the name of Jesus Christ, and bring 
them to the Lord. Come, men of Decatur. Come on, women 
of Decatur. Let's go out and do something for God, home, and 
native land. Let the world know the standard of Jesus Christ. 
Jacksonville has cleaned up for Jesus Christ. Bloomington is 
cleaning up for Christ, and Decatur is not agoing to trail behind 
any longer. 

" 'Lord, is it I ?' 

"Just another word and I am through. I want to say some- 
thing about this lying world with its false people. Peter, James 
and John were the favored disciples of Jesus Christ. They went 
with him up onto the mount of transfiguration. Peter, James 
and John stood by the grave at the resurrection. Peter wrote the 
epistle which bears his name, and preached the sermon of the 
Pentecost. John became the greatest preacher the world has 
ever seen. He wrote the book of John and then wrote Revelations. 
James wrote the book that bears his name. What about 
Jesus Christ? As long as the world stands here we will hear of 
Him. 

" 'Lord, is it I ?' You can stay right here. I am going to Jesus 
Christ. You can seek pleasure, if you want to. But I am going 
to Jesus Christ. You can stay here, if you want to. I don't. 

"How many will say, 'God, I am going to do the best I can to 
bring people to Christ? I am going to bring my neighbors and 
friends to Jesus Christ.' I want every man and woman to stand 
up that will bring people to Jesus Christ. I don't want you to 
stand up if you don't mean it." 



236 Life and Labors of 



EVENING SERMON 

"I am indebted to a friend of mine for part of the outline of 
my message tonight. I read everything that I can get my eyes 
on or my hands upon and that I have time and strength for, and 
if I read anything that will give the Devil a good run for his 
money, I use it. I don't always remember where I get anything, 
and sometimes I forget to give credit. 

"Somebody has said, if you love drama, read the Bible, for 
it is most intensely dramatic, highly interesting, striking and 
graphic in description ; and it deals with the lives of the rich and 
the poor, and the white and the black, learned and illiterate. 

"Probably one of the most intensely interesting descriptions 
ever penned or depicted, is to be found in the fifth chapter of 
Daniel. A few years ago I can remember reading where the 
higher critics said that the characters of Daniel and Belshazzar 
were legendary, mythical, and traditionary. And Rawlinson 
brought to the surface tablets of stone upon which were many of 
the passages and dates of Daniel chronicled, and from that time 
until now I have not heard a peep or cheep about Daniel being 
legendary. And I can remember when skeptics had much to say 
about Christ fasting in the wilderness forty days and Moses on 
the mountain. They said it was absolutely impossible for any 
man to go forty days without food. And then Doctor Tanner 
fasted for fifty-two days and then for over sixty days ; and I have 
never heard a peep since about Jesus fasting forty days in the 
wilderness. 

" At that time Belshazzar was supreme in command in the king- 
dom of Nabonidas, who was on a military expedition. And old 
Cyrus came up and laid siege to the city and Belshazzar became 
puffed with his newly gotten power and gave his famous feast. 
And the old palace blazed with light, and I can see the long tables 
with room for a thousand guests, and can see them as they loll 
there in their drunken stupor. And finally a strange conceit 
seems to enter the head of the young fellow and he beckons to his 
chef, or steward, and he comes over and they whisper and the 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 237 

steward leaves the room, followed by a retinue of servants. And 
they go out and presently walk back staggering under the weight 
of vessels of gold and silver which Belshazzar's grandfather, 
Nebuchadnezzar, had taken from the temple. And these vessels 
had been used as a part of the worship of Jehovah, and he ordered 
them filled with wine, and to show his hatred, passed these ves- 
sels around and his lords and wives and concubines, quaffed to 
their heart's content, and sang praises to the gods of gold and 
silver. And the hilarity seemed to increase and more and more 
boisterous they become. And faster and faster fly the fleet of 
these lewd and partially nude dancing women that wriggled and 
twirled down the hall and went through their cancan, hooche- 
cooche dance, to please the old libertines that sat lolling at the 
table. 

"And presently a hush like death fell upon that drunken crowd 
and out from the air shot an armless hand and a pen writing let- 
ters on the frieze — which blazed and burned into their souls and 
struck terror to their hearts. Belshazzar sees it and his counte- 
nance changes and his knees smote one against another, and the 
joints of his loins were loosed and old Bel was about all in, I tell 
you; he got cold feet. By and by he kind of pulls himself to- 
gether and remembers that he is it and the whole cheese, and the 
main works in that blow-out and he called for his sooth-sayers, 
or as we say 'mediums/ and they came in, and I can see magi- 
cians richly caparisoned, eager and anxious to read the hand- 
writing on the wall and pull the wool over his eyes and enrich 
themselves at his expense. 

"And they stand before Belshazzar trying to tell him what the 
writing means, and stagger back unable to decipher the strange 
hieroglyphics. And terror again seizes the drunken crowd. 
And then Belshazzar sends for his mother — many a young buck 
has no use for his mother as long as he can walk into a grog 
shop and put fifteen or twenty glasses of beer under his belt — and 
he can buck the tiger and carry home some other fellow's money. 
He has no use for mother or the preacher, but he waits until the 
strong hand of the law rests on his shoulders and he is put behind 
some prison bars — then he begins to think that the people that 



238 Life and Labors of 

rebuked him were not such fools. Many a girl calls her mother 
a fool. She wants to stay out until 10 o'clock at night and gad 
the streets with some Tom, Dick and Harry, when she ought to 
be home in bed; and she will wait until the mute evidence of 
illicit affection can no longer be hidden, and in a few months 
she will be the mother of an illegitimate child ; and then she will 
not say that her mother was the fool, but that she was the little 
jack-ass and fool. 

"Then he sent for his mother, and she came in and said: 'Oh, 
king, live forever; let not your doubts trouble you. Do not be 
worried. There is a man in your kingdom that will be able to 
decipher the strange hieroglyphics.' And Belshazzar sends for 
Daniel, and he walks into his presence. 

" 'Oh, Daniel/ says the king, 'I have heard about you. Ma 
has told me, and I have sent for you. I have a bunch of sooth- 
sayers that have been eating off me, and I have been feeding the 
guys and I have brought them and they cannot do anything to 
help me ; if you can, get busy. I am in an awful hole. If you can 
help me I will give you a gold ring, and a chain and a purple 
robe, and you shall ride behind me in a chariot/ 

"Dan says, 'Keep your gold and chains and robes of royalty. 
I don't care to ride behind you. I had rather hot-hoof it than to 
ride behind you. Look at me. Have you forgotten that your 
grandfather became puffed up ? And didn't he walk out one day 
and say, "Is this not the great Babylon that I have builded?" 
and didn't his reason forsake him? and his body become covered 
with long hairs? And didn't he lie out in the grass like the 
hogs for seven years, and didn't the sun shine on him by day and 
the dew fall on him by night? Have you forgotten? Will you 
not learn by example? Will you have no sense? Will you not 
learn to quit fighting God?' 

"Then Daniel looked up and said: 'I will read your writing/ 
And he read, 'Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin/ 'Mene — God hath 
numbered thy kingdom and finished it. Tekel — thou art weighed 
in the balances and art found wanting. Peres — thy kingdom is 
divided and given to the Medes and the Persians.' And Belshaz- 
zar called for a robe of royalty and put it around Daniel, and 
the hilarity increased. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 239 

"And listen — I hear the tramp, tramp, tramp of soldiers, for 
old Cyrus, while Belshazzar cursed and drank more wine, was 
pounding at the gates. And he was turning the course of the 
Euphrates river so that he could come in on the bed of the river. 
And three gates had been left open. And they poured through 
these gates with their battle axes and spears and rapped on the 
door of the banquet hall, and men and women became impaled 
on the spears of the enemy and the banquet hall became a slaughter 
house and a morgue and the floor was soaked with blood and 
gore. And that night was Belshazzar, the king of the Chaldeans, 
slain. He had been weighed in the balance and found wanting. 
In whose balance was he weighed? 

"I am going to take the Ten Commandments as a basis of what I 
have to say tonight. And I want to say right here that I believe 
that God wrote the Ten Commandments. Infidels say that Moses 
wrote them, or Bob Ingersoll, or Strauss, or Bauer, or Renan, or 
Bolingbroke, or Voltaire, or Tyndall, or Huxley, or Spencer, or 
some of those old guys. But I am right ready to say that God 
Almighty wrote them. But I don't care a rap who wrote 'em. 

"Any citizen that is not ready to live on a level with the Ten 
Commandments deserves to be shut up in the penitentiary. There 
can be no good citizenship where the Ten Commandments are 
broken. There is no such thing as a movement for social reform 
not built on the Ten Commandments. There is no decent life, no 
life of purity or power, but rests on them. I don't care who you 
are. And I tell you I am ready to take my stand right here on 
the Ten Commandments, and when the world is burned to ashes 
I v/ill find my feet on a foundation just as sure as God. 

"Whose balances ? Why, God's ; not your estimate of yourself. 
Not in public opinion; you may lack nothing; you may be the 
greatest man in Decatur, that does not change it. You may be 
the biggest tax payer. God will not weigh you by one standard 
and me by another, but every man and woman by the same stan- 
dard. The standard by which he weighs the man in the clinker- 
pit is the same as for the man on the carpet. And the engineer and 
the call-boy by the same standard, and George Gould by just 
the same standard as the fellow that drives spikes on the section. 



240 Life and Labors of 

"How are you weighed ? Not by public opinion. Roger Bacon 
had the power of perspection and could see what was about to 
transpire, and they said he was a devil because he could do that. 
Galileo said the earth moved, and on his knees he was compelled 
to retract, but he arose and said, 'It does move just the same.' 
Who was right? Galileo or public opinion? He was right and 
there was Newton who discovered the law of gravitation. For 
30 years he was unhonored and repudiated and the world refused 
to hear his teachings. Who was right, public opinion or Newton ? 
Doctor Jenner discovered vaccination and by it he reduced the 
fatalities of smallpox from 98 in a hundred to 4 in a hundred. I 
had rather have smallpox than typhoid fever or pneumonia. Give 
it another name and you would not be afraid of smallpox. Keep 
your old carcass clean and you won't have the filthy disease in 
most cases. Look at diphtheria. It used to be fatal in 98 out of 
a 100 cases, and antitoxin came along and it was railed at and 
ridiculed, and today the world takes off its hat to Doctor Jenner. 
Public opinion cannot determine. For when they were building 
a railroad from Liverpool to Manchester a lord introduced a bill 
to prevent the trains running for he said the trains will go so 
fast that they will pull the wool off the backs of the sheep. People 
cannot breathe if the trains go 20 miles an hour and the cinders 
will cover the passengers and people will be asphyxiated by the 
gas, and they introduced a bill to prevent them from building a 
railroad. What jack-asses they were; you all know that. If they 
had followed that you fellows would all be out of a job tonight. 
So history shows that whenever men have touched the prejudice 
that interfered with some vested right and struck hard blows 
against some old evil, they could prepare to be the subject of 
slander. 

"Society is the god of some people. They will do anything that 
society requires and demands, and if you did not do it you would 
lose your social position. They would not invite you if you 
didn't want to do it, and when they extend an invitation they expect 
you to play cards and drink wine, and if you did not you would 
not get another invitation to come there. You put society first; 
you please some people before you please God. You will please 
everybody that is decent if you please God. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 241 

"Major Whittle was being shown through a beautiful home 
in Washington, D. C, built by a multi-millionaire, and he took 
the major into a room that would probably seat 500 people, and 
there were no pillars but huge steel girders that supported the 
roof and there were sky-lights, and it was a beautiful, magnificent 
room, and the major said: 'Is this to be the music room, or per- 
haps it is for an art gallery? What is it for?' And finally the 
owner said: 'Major, I am ashamed to tell you ; it is a ball room.' 
'My God, have you gotten so far down from God and so low 
down that you will put a ball room under your roof?' 'I don't 
want it here. I wish it was at the bottom of the sea. But my 
wife and daughters have gone out in Washington society (I don't 
believe any society in the country is more rotten and honey- 
combed than that of Washington, D.C.). My wife and daughters 
have gone out in Washington society and if we do not have a ball 
room we will be ostracized and stigmatized and life will be un- 
bearable.' And the major said : 'God pity you, when you start out 
to please society rather than God,' and that ball room wrecked 
the family. 

" 'Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.' 

"I think there is nothing that shows the foundation of a man's 
character so rotten as to hear him stand around street corners 
and cuss and damn. 'Honor thy father and thy mother.' Take 
the average young man today. There is the college dude. He 
has a suit of clothes on that has goods enough in the seat of them 
to make four pairs of breeches. He has got his pants rolled up 
at the bottom half way to his knees. He has got his bottom but- 
ton buttoned on his coat. He has got a hat on his head that 
looks like a pan cake. He shoves his hands down into his pock- 
ets half way to his elbows ; he has got a cigarette in his mouth, 
the little fool. He calls his father and mother the old man and 
the old woman, and he couldn't earn money enough to pay for the 
suit of clothes that covers his old carcass. 'Honor thy father 
and thy mother.' 

"I tell you the young man and woman who is ashamed of his 
or her father or mother simply because the brilliancy has failed 
them, because the sparkle of youth has left their eyes, and the 




242 Life and Labors of 

rose has left their cheeks, is a fool. You are a big fool and a big 
fool at that, if your mother had thought less of herself or rather 
more of herself, I guess she might be just as handsome as you 
are, for she was once just as handsome as you are, sis. She 
might be wearing better clothes now than she is if she had not 
made the old dresses over and made it do two or three years. 
She might look a great deal better if she had not made the winter 
hat do service as a summer hat in order that you might have a 
new dress or bonnet. I tell you the wrinkles in her face and the 
great lines in her face, girls, and the weary look in her eyes, why, 
don't you know they are simply lovemarks for you? And show 
how she has labored and toiled for you ? 

"Perhaps your father, boys, he don't appear just as well as you 
would like to have him, when you have got company. You would 
blush a little to think that the old man might come in his shirt 
sleeves and stocking feet and sit down in front of the fireplace 
and doze a little. Yes, but remember, boys, his hard calloused 
hands and bent form and his bronzed face tell of his unselfishness 
and willingness to sacrifice for you. And his anxiety for you, 
they tell how hard he worked, so that when he dies and you put 
his body in the grave, and the next day when the landlord knocks 
at the door and asks you for the rent, you have got a little roll to 
go to and say, 'here, here is the dough/ Yes, he worked hard, 
and that is why he did that. I want to tell you that when you 
look at that old bent form and hard hands, men, listen, and 
when you listen to his weak, piping voice, you should be proud 
of him, and be prouder of what you look upon. What you look 
upon is not something of manly physical beauty of form, but it 
is a crown for you to look upon, young fellow. It shows his 
love for you. Don't be ashamed of him when you meet him on 
the street. 

" 'Honor thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long/ 
God Almighty will wring your little neck and put you in a coffin 
if you don't. 'Honor thy father and thy mother that thy days 
may be long upon the land of the Lord thy God.' Honor thy 
father and thy mother. 

" 'Thou shalt not kill/ Oh, you say, we are all right here. We 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 243 

have no murderers here. But there are other ways of killing be- 
sides sticking a knife into a person's heart, or pounding out his 
brains. There are other ways of killing. Many a husband is 
killing his wife because of his unfaithfulness to his marriage vows. 
Many a wife is killing her husband for the same reason. Many 
a poor woman is sent prematurely to her grave. There are other 
ways of killing than by shooting a man with a gun or by pound- 
ing out his brains. 

"I was preaching down in this state one afternoon when a 
woman came walking down the aisle dressed in the height of 
fashion. I heard the rattle of her silk dress 20 feet from the 
platform. She walked up and stood in front of me. She wore a 
sealskin coat trimmed with Russian sable. She had great big 
diamonds in her ears that sent forth sparkles, and a rope of pearls 
around her neck, and a tiara sun-burst in her hair. She was 
covered with the most expensive jewels and garments. And 
she looked up at me and a tear glittered in her eye. She said: 
'Mr. Sunday, are you going to preach to men only tomorrow 
afternoon?' 'Yes, ma'am!' 'Are you going to say anything in 
your sermon about husbands being untrue to their wives ?' I said, 
'Yes, I think I will make a few remarks on that subject.' 'Do 
you make it plain?' 'So plain that the newspaper needs asbestos 
paper to print the edition.' She said, 'You can tell by my attire 
I don't need money. I have got an account with one of the first 
jewelers in Chicago. I have an account with one of the best 
dressmakers in Chicago. I have several thousand a year for pin 
money to spend. I have a beautiful home and have a retinue of 
servants to wait on me. I can go and come when I please. I 
have my own equipage, but my womanly, wifely heart reaches 
out and yearns for something more than fine clothes, fine clothes, 
jewels and servants. I don't believe any woman was made but 
what thinks like that,' she said. She said, 'Husband is killing me.' 
I said, 'My dear woman, you look as though you have lots of 
trouble. Will you do something to help yourself ?' 'Yes.' 'Well, 
then you get on your knees at half-past two and pray for him 
while I knock down, skin and drag out.' If ever I skinned a 
bunch it was that afternoon. I want to serve notice on you now 



244 Life and Labors of 

I haven't forgotten how yet either. No sir, no sir, Thou shalt 
not kill/ 

" Thou shalt not commit adultery.' This isn't the time and 
place to enter into much of a discussion of that commandment, 
'thou shalt not commit adultery.' But I want to say there is no 
sin that God rails and thunders against like adultery. There is 
nothing worse than a husband who is untrue to his wife. There 
is nothing worse than a man who is untrue to his marriage vows. 
And there is nothing worse than a woman who is untrue to her 
marriage vows. Thou shalt not commit adultery.' 

'There is no sin against which God rails or which brings a 
curse upon individuals or a community more than the sin of 
adultery. Adultery caused God to burn Sodom and Gomorrah. 
Adultery caused God to flood the world. Adultery caused the 
volcano of Vesuvius to vomit forth its smoke and lava and ashes 
and bury Pompeii and Herculaneum forty feet beneath the cind- 
ers. Thou shalt not commit adultery.' 

" Thou shalt not steal.' A man is a thief that takes that for 
which he does not give adequate property or money in return. A 
man is a thief that sells that which is falsely represented. I tell you 
a merchant is a thief when he sells you a piece of goods and says 
that it is all wool when it is half cotton. He is a thief when he 
sells an article that he says is imported when it is made in Chi- 
cago or Peoria or St. Louis. He is a thief. He is a thief that 
sells an article as being pure when it is adulterated. He is a thief 
when he sells you pepper that is made of brickdust. He is a thief 
when he sells pulverized sugar with Bedford sand in it. He is a 
thief that makes an employee work for less wages than he would 
work for, or wages that he cannot support his wife and children 
on. He is a thief. 

"I thoroughly agree with my friend, W. J. Bryan, who in an 
address in New York City the other day, said : 'As a rule a man 
who steals a million dollars has a better chance of keeping out of 
the penitentiary than the man who steals a thousand. So true has 
this been of late,' he says, 'that I would suggest that we change 
the commandment to read, Thou shalt not steal on a small scale.' 

' 'Listen ; he says that the man who stands by the highway and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 245 

shoves a gun under your nose and demands your money or your 
life, is no more a criminal than the thief in a larger measure. The 
standard of morality and decency is the same with them as it is 
with the corporation who gets control of the nation's fuel supply 
and makes the poor pay double for his coal supply, or lets your 
wife and children freeze in the winter. He is a thief. The trust 
and monopoly get control of some of the commodities and then 
run the prices up so high that the working man cannot have what 
he needs. He is a blackhearted thief that puts a commodity out 
of the reach of the poor man. That is the reason I am for the 
labor unions and the men with the dinner bucket and will fight for 
him every time. 

" 'Thou shalt not steal' A working man is a thief when he 
don't give back his employer honest labor for the wages he pays 
him. An employer is a thief if he don't pay the wages that you 
earn. He is a thief if he don't give honest work for the wages 
he does pay him. A gambler is a thief. A man is a gambler I 
don't care if he bets on a horse race, the election, a foot ball game 
or a base ball game. He is a thief. A man who bets and loses is 
a fool and the man who bets and wins is a thief ; so every gambler 
is a fool or a thief. 

"We had a crusade in this country a few years ago and it cov- 
ered the whole country. It drove the Louisiana State Lottery 
out, the greatest gambling hell that there ever was. No, I take 
that back. The Louisiana Lottery was a New Jerusalem and a 
Sunday School, compared to Wall Street. We can reproduce the 
railroads of this country for six billion dollars and they are bonded 
for fifteen billion. A man took me to task for that statement, an 
official of the Alton railroad up at Bloomington, who said we could 
not reproduce the property, and the right of way and all the roll- 
ing stock for that. But when the Illinois Central railroad came 
through the State of Illinois the state gave it large land grants. 
We can't reproduce the railroads to day. But we could originally. 
They were produced originally for six billion dollars and they 
are bonded at fifteen billion dollars. That stock is watered. 

" 'Thou shalt not steal.' There are great national thieves. We 
find that in the life insurance. It is seen all around us. 'Thou 
shalt not steal.' 



246 Life and Labors of 

" 'Bearing false witness against thy neighbor.' 'Well, we are 
all right there/ you say. 'We haven't been called into court.' 
God don't care anything about the court. You don't have to go 
into the court room. You don't need to go to be a liar. You 
don't have to go on the witness stand to hear something deroga- 
tory about your neighbor. You don't stop to find out if you are 
peddling the truth. You heard a lot of lies raised about me be- 
fore ever I came to this town, didn't you? Why don't some of 
those people come up and deliver the goods? They have been 
talking about me but I haven't seen any of them come up here 
and say anything. If what they say about me isn't true, then what 
you heard is a lie. But if what you heard is true, then I am a 
liar. If I don't live according to this Book I challenge the world 
to go back through the years that I have been preaching Jesus 
Christ to come up and prove one thing against me. 

"Of all the men on earth who are on the platform if I didn't 
live up to what I preach they would not let me alone five minutes. 
That whisky-gang would be astride my neck in a minute. What 
is the matter? They know they can't do it. 

" 'Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's maid servant.' Some wom- 
an has a good girl. You have had a lot of trouble with your girls. 
You can't keep one for more than a month or two and she has had 
hers for years. You say you would like to have that girl. You 
meet her and ask her how much she is getting. 'Well, I will give 
you 50 cents more a week.' Let her alone. 'Thou shalt not covet 
thy neighbor's maid servant/ 

"A merchant has a good delivery boy. He is polite. The 
customers like him and he has brought a lot of trade. You go 
over there and offer him five or six dollars to come and work for 
you. Let him alone. You have no business doing it. You men 
that are looking up here, what are you going to do ? There isn't 
a man out there that hasn't broken some of these commandments 
of God. What are you going to do? If we confess our faith 
in Jesus and clean up our souls, all will be forgiven. If you have 
broken all of the commandments — every one of them — if you con- 
fess your sins to God He will forgive you and they will be for- 
given and blotted out. That is what God will do. What are you 
going to do? 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 247 

"Here is another— 'Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house, 
nor his man servant, nor his maid servant, nor his ox, nor his 
ass, or anything that is thy neighbor's.' 

" 'Thou shalt not covet.' 'Thou shalt not steal.' A man covets 
and then he steals. A burglar covets the money in a safe and 
then he cracks the safe. The beginning of a thief is covetousness. 
God wanted to guard a fellow from both ends, and the Lord put 
a flag on both ends. 

"If you don't covet a thing you won't steal it. 'Thou shalt not 
covet thy neighbor's wife.' Let the other fellow's wife alone and 
keep your eyes on yours." 



EVENING SERMON 

No man cared for my soul. — Psalms 142:4. 

"Life and nature seem to be made up largely of contrasts ; mid- 
night and noon, summer and winter, heat and cold, drouth and 
rain, famine and plenty, hills and valleys, mountains and plains, 
sickness and health, vice and virtue, thieves and honest people, 
libertines and the virtuous, joy and sorrow. Look from the same 
window, vice and virtue walk the same streets, and sit side by 
side. The hearse follows quickly after the bridal procession, 
and the funeral dirge is heard with the wedding march. Tears 
follow laughter, and every life is made up of contrasts, and I be- 
lieve no life in history, sacred or profane, presents a larger num- 
ber than that of David who was the author of my Psalm tonight. 

"I am first introduced to him when a shepherd lad. Samuel 
was sent to anoint David king of Israel. He kept the flag flying 
when the clouds hung lowering, and God used him to preserve 
the posterity of the Jews. I find that he did what a great many 
others do, he sinned and dragged the name of God up and down, 
in filth and corruption. And then I find that he did what a great 
many of you have not had the manhood to do, and that is to con- 
fess your sins and to forsake them, and he became by so doing a 
saint of God, until he charms us by his marvelous experience and 
by his walk with God. 



248 Life and Labors of 

"He was also a poet of no mean ability and a musician too, 
and played for King Saul, and charmed him in his melancholy 
moods. And he was a warrior too, and of all generals David 
takes his rank among those that are most famous, that had ever 
led. men. And his son rebelled against him — the people turned 
from him, and he was compelled to flee from the palace. And 
•they chased him like a partridge, and he took refuge in the cave 
of Engedi, and then he said: 'I looked on my right hand and 
on my left and the refuge failed me; and no man cared for my 
soul.' 'No man cared for my soul.' Old King Saul with 3,000 
chosen men hunted David and in the little cave on the coast of 
the Dead Sea he took refuge, and it wrung from his lips and 
heart the words that have rung down through the centuries, that 
I have chosen for my text tonight, 'No man cared for my soul.' 

"It seems strange to me that any man in any age of history 
should use words like these, and these words are the honest ex- 
pression of what he believed to be ; the lack of interest manifested 
by people as to what he did, or became, or how he lived, or when 
he died. 

"It seems strange, more than passing strange to me, that with 
the great opportunities that men and women enjoy of hearing the 
gospel of Jesus Christ, it seems so strange that any unsaved man 
in your day and mine, with such privileges of believing as we do, 
should use words like this and have them to be an honest expres- 
sion of lack of interest manifested by people as to whether he 
went to heaven or to hell, when he died. Did you ever notice what 
a great concern we manifest for people in times of physical danger 
and distress? Why, you let the cry of a child ring out at mid- 
night and you will rush to its aid. Let the fire alarm ring and 
men will rush out. When the message came that San Francisco 
was lying in ruins we ran our hands in our pockets up to the el- 
bows, and an endless, ceaseless stream of gold poured to the Pa- 
cific coast. And you were proud that at a time like that, you were 
an American, and had not lost all sympathy and desire to help 
those in need. 

"A friend of mine told me that he sat one day in a hotel eating 
his dinner when the fire alarm sounded a 4-1 1 which summoned 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 249 

all the reserves. He hurried to complete his meal and went down 
the street and stopped in front of a building nine stories high 
where the walls were supposed to be fire-proof. The fire had 
started in the second story and many were driven to the top of 
the building and others were caught. The firemen came and it 
was 25 degrees below zero and the hydrants were frozen and the 
hose was attached to a standpipe, which with a regulation normal 
pressure can rip the shingles from the roof, and with five engines 
coupled to the standpipe they could not get force enough to break 
the window panes and when the people were driven out by the 
heat they raised the windows and then when the flames shot out 
they took hold of the window ledges with their hands, and he 
stood there and watched. The hands burnt loose — seventeen of 
them tumbled and struck the pavement below and lives were 
snuffed out and the people were in mourning and business was 
suspended and money poured like water to the stricken, and the 
great seedsman, D. M. Ferry, gave $5,000, and said he would 
send $5,000 more if necessary, and in a few minutes $50,000 had 
been subscribed, and my friend said that he could not recall the 
scene for some weeks without sleep forsaking him, and forgetting 
to eat. 

"In times of physical distress what concern we manifest. And 
why not in times of spiritual? Men will pass on the street, and 
rub elbows in the lodge and never open their lips to save a man 
from hell. 'No man cared for my soul.' It is a solemn thought 
to me when they have been in your own church and sat in your 
pew and were of your constituency, but you have not tried to 
help them to Jesus Christ. You have never done that. 

"A friend of mine told me he had as a regular attendant at his 
church a man and woman who were multi-millionaires, neither of 
whom were Christians. They were liberal contributors to the cur- 
rent expenses, but he had never spoken to them about Jesus Christ. 
And he said that 'The Lord seemed to trouble me for their salva- 
tion.' He said that he argued the question by saying: 'Why, Lord, 
to go and to speak to them about being Christians — that would be 
zeal without knowledge. And I might offend them and lose the 
prestige of their influence and their contribution.' And God 



250 Life and Labors of 

seemed to say : 'Don't argue the question with me. You go and 
ask them to be Christians and if they refuse and leave, you are 
free from their blood And if you don't speak to them and they 
die I will hold you responsible for the loss of their souls.' And 
he said, 'I will do it the next time I see them.' 

'The next time was Sunday morning, and when the sermon 
was over he went down and spoke to them and said: 'I have 
come to ask you a question I have never asked you. You have 
come regularly to hear me for years and I have never spoken 
to you about being Christians. I come to ask you to give your 
hearts to Jesus.' They looked at me a moment and thanked me 
with tears in their eyes. They said: "That is the first personal 
invitation we ever had to be Christians and we have listened to 
you preach, and not one of the 2,000 members in your church ever 
asked us to be Christians. We have gone to their homes and they 
have come into our home, but never has one asked us to be Chris- 
tians." Certainly they could say the words of my text, and say 
they didn't care for their souls, but only for their contributions 
to the current expenses. 

"It is strange that any man could use words like this and es- 
pecially in your day and mine. And to me it is sadder still when 
it is a true picture of your own home. A picture of parents who 
have never asked their children to give their hearts to Jesus Christ. 

"I will never forget 14 years ago in Paris, 111., where I was 
holding meetings. One night I was leaving the tent, and among 
the number that left last was a young man who especially 
attracted me by his pleasing manner and neat attire and his per- 
fect physique and his personality and appearance. And we walked 
down the street together and I engaged him in conversation, and 
we had not gone a block when I asked him the question, 'Are you 
a Christian ?' 'No sir ; I am not.' 'Are your father and mother 
alive?' 'Yes, both.' 'Are they Christians? Is your father one?' 
'I don't know. He is a steward in the Methodist church.' 'Is 
.your mother a Christian?' 'Oh, I don't know. She is a member 
of the same church and superintendent of the Sunday School.' 
'Have you a brother or sister?' 'Yes, a sister.' 'Is she a Chris- 
tian?' 'She teaches in the primary department in the Sunday 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 251 

school.' 'Have your father or mother ever talked to you about 
being a Christian?' 'As long as I can remember my father, 
mother or sister have never asked me.' 'Do you have family 
prayer?' 'No.' 'Does your father ask a blessing at the table?' 
'No. Do you believe they think that I will be lost and have 
never asked me to be a Christian ?' 

"I confess that his question staggered me. I can see him stand- 
ing under the electric light and hear his words ring in my ears. 
But I could not win him because his father and mother did not 
have as much interest as I, a stranger. Certainly he had a right 
to say the words of my text: 'No man cared for my soul.' 

"I will tell you a little explanation of this text. You may think 
that your life is unworthy. Your life is just what you want it to 
be. If you want it to be different it will be different. For God 
stands pledged to help you to make it different. You sit there a 
sinner and if you want to keep in sin all hell will help you. If 
you want to be a Christian all heaven will help you. It is up to 
you what you will be. 

"There are not devils enough in hell to make you a sinner if 
you don't want to be, not angels enough in heaven to keep you 
from being a sinner. And if you want to be a Christian all heaven 
is pledged to help you and if you want to be a sinner all hell will 
help. And you have it in your hands to settle the proposition. 
Sometimes a sermon preached to an audience will do this work if 
Biblical, if it is based on the atonement and faith in Jesus Christ. 
But I want to tell you, my friends, sermons will never win this 
old world for Jesus Christ. And the world will never be won by 
the unaided clergy. Any preacher or evangelist that thinks 
preaching is going to save the old world is mightily mistaken. 

"I believe there is many a man and many a woman in heaven 
tonight that would be in hell if God hadn't backed the hearse up 
to their door in time. 

"My friend Professor Knox was telling me a story that hap- 
pened in Iowa one time. He was preaching up there and while 
he was preaching an awful epidemic of diphtheria reached the 
city. The whole city was quarantined. They were dying by the 
score. Sixty-three died in one day. 



252 Life and Labors of 

"He knew of a family, the father of whom was a drunkard, 
the editor of an infidel paper, and who had no faith in Jesus Christ, 
and had never taken much interest in his home. His little girl, 
Mabel, had been attending Sunday school at his church and one 
day after coming home she was taken ill with the fever. She 
wanted her father to send for my friend, Knox, but he said : 'No, 
I don't want him around my house.' 

"The little girl continued to grow worse. Again she requested 
her father to send for Knox. This man's wife had been a good 
Christian woman, had been married to this man a number of years 
and tried to help her little ones to God. 

"She kept on begging for Knox to come to her, and her father 
said he didn't allow any preacher in his home. Finally, when 
the girl grew so bad that he thought she was going to die he re- 
lented and sent for Knox. 

"He told me that as he neared the house and as he was walk- 
ing up the steps of the house he met the physician coming down 
the steps. He said to the doctor: 'How is Mabel?' He said: 
'She is very ill and I don't think she will live until midnight ; she 
may live later than that, but she will never see the sun rise on 
this beautiful earth.' 

"My friend said he went into the room where Mabel lay and 
stood by the bedside, looking at the little girl. When she saw 
him her eyes lighted up and a smile played over her face. He 
asked her what she wanted him to talk about and she asked him 
to talk about heaven and the angels where her mamma was, where 
you go to love Jesus. She said she wanted to go there where the 
angels were and see her mamma. 

"Her father stood there watching her every move and when 
he heard her tell Knox that she was going to where the angels 
were and to see her mamma, he leaned over her and said: 
'Honey, you ain't going to die, and leave papa here alone, are 
you? It would just kill papa if you should leave. You will get 
well.' She said, 'No, that she was going to go to heaven and 
. see Jesus.' 

"Knox stayed at the little home until he heard the clock strike 
twelve, and he noticed Mabel had turned her face to the wall and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 253 

was apparently asleep. When he heard the clock strike 12 130 he 
turned and said: 'Well, I guess I will go now, Mr. Pelton, I 
have stayed as long as I feel that I can and there are so many 
people that want to see me.' He said : 'I beg of you don't go yet. 
I think I will die, it will be so lonesome here.' Knox said : 'Well, 
if it will help you any I will stay here with you until 1 130/ 

"Mabel still lay with her face to the wall and breathing regu- 
larly all the time. At last my friend said : 'Well, good night, I 
will go now. If I can do you any good, send for me.' He said he 
hadn't gone four blocks before Mabel leaped out of bed and threw 
her arms around her father's neck and said : 'Is that you, father, 
where have you been?' He said: 'I haven't been away.' Her 
teeth were chattering and her lips were cold and her finger nails 
were purple. 

"She said: 'Papa, you won't let me get in the river, will you? 
I will freeze.' 'Why, honey, don't you know me? You are not 
in the river, you are in papa's arms. Don't you feel his hand on 
your forehead as I brush your hair back ?' She smiled and said : 
'Oh, is that you, papa? When did you come?' 'Why, honey, I 
haven't been away.' Pretty soon she said again: 'Don't let my 
feet get in the river, papa, they will freeze ; don't let my feet get 
in the river.' He said : 'You are not in the river, you are in papa's 
arms, don't you feel papa's heart beat ?' as he placed her head on 
his breast. She smiled and said: 'Oh, is that you, papa? When 
did you come back?' He said: 'I haven't been gone, honey, I 
have been here all the time/ 

"Pretty soon she broke away from him and reached out her 
hand toward something imaginary. Her face lit up with a smile 
and turning to her father, she said: 'Papa, you need not carry 
me over the river. Yonder I see mamma coming and the angels ; 
they are here and we are going to our immortal home.' 

"He lay her on the bed and sent for my friend, Knox. He did 
not send for the president of the infidel club. I tell you it takes 
a board of trade failure, a Spanish war, evolution, astronomy, 
biology, they all make a good text when one is alive, when there 
are no empty chairs around the table and no empty clothes hang- 
ing in the closet, and no new-made grave in the family lot; but 



254 Life and Labors of 

I want to tell you, sir, your heart yearns for the old time religion 
of Jesus Christ and the world then won't console you with gospel. 

"It is all right for a young fellow to swell out his chest 38 inches 
and stand up to a bar and brush the foam off a mug of beer, but 
when the hearse backs up to the front of your house, then that is 
another proposition. You haven't any use for the preacher as 
long as you can cut the coupons off your bonds every interest 
bearing day. You pass the preacher and sneer at him and you 
are satisfied until the doctor shakes his head and then you get 
the preacher there just ahead of the hearse. 

"Send for any preacher. He will get up out of his bed and 
come to the bedside of the dying. Send for me and I would get 
up and come ; I would be glad to come. But you don't give God 
a fair chance. You wait until the death dew is on your brow, 
then you send for the preacher to see if he can't pull you back out 
of hell and push you into the kingdom of God. 

"He sent for my friend Knox. When he came he said to him : 
'Pelton, God has spoken to you. The next time He speaks He 
may call you. Why don't you accept God before it is too late?' 
He dropped to his knees and gave his heart to Christ. He gave 
up his publication of infidelity and his son became a preacher. He 
is now in Iowa. 

"I stood on the platform one time telling that story when out 
of the choir came a man and touched me on the shoulder. He 
said to me : 'That story is a true one and everybody in the town 
knows it.' 

"Don't wait all your lifetime until the time of trouble before 
you go to God. Do it now. The only time that God can get in 
the heart of some people is in time of trouble. He is waiting and 
ready for you, don't wait until trouble comes to accept Him. Do 
it now. 

" 'No man cared for my soul/ 

"I tell you about Jesus Christ. You must have eyes in the back 
of your head if you don't see that Decatur and the surrounding 
country is going to witness the greatest awakening that has ever 
swept this section of the country. Thousands are going to be 
pressed into the kingdom of God. Your wife and children are 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 255 

already there. The old gospel ship is going to careen down past 
the factory, Mueller's, past the shops, Wabash, going down past 
the bank, banker, going down past the hotel, landlord, going down 
past the office, lawyer, they are calling for you. They are coming 
past the Herald and the Review. It is going to come to you, too, 
Labor World, going by your door, and going to the door of every- 
body. There will be a multitude on deck. We are coming down 
after you, auditors, and you, reporters, and bankers, and landlords, 
and lawyers, and doctors, and railroad men. Get on, factory men. 
Many are on already, and a great awakening like this that is com- 
ing, no man has ever seen. 

"Listen to this. 'No man cared for my soul.' I want to tell 
you this. The world don't care. I want to say this to you, go 
and listen. The world don't care for your soul. The world gives 
you money. The world gives you fame. The world gives you a 
chance to win fame. The world will create opportunities for you 
to climb the ladder of fame. The world will give you a chance 
to be a leader of men in the great world. Go on. I want to say 
to you, go on. After you climb to the dizzy heights, after you 
amass a fortune, after coming to those heights without Jesus 
Christ, 'what shall it profit a man?' If a man lose his soul, what 
has he got? 

"I would not trade my soul for the whole of Decatur. I would 
not trade my soul for a million Decaturs. What is Decatur com- 
pared to Macon county? What is Macon county compared to 
the State of Illinois ? Would you trade your soul for Chicago ? 
What is Chicago compared with New York ? What is New York 
compared with the United States? What is the United States 
compared with Europe ? With all its wealth would you give your 
soul for the United States? No. For Europe? No. I would 
rather have standing room in heaven than all this world. I would 
rather turn down every inch of ground in God Almighty's earth, 
every peck of gold and every precious stone in the world, if to 
take that would give my soul to hell. It is left to you, and you 
can take it or turn it down." 



256 Life and Labors of 



EVENING SERMON 

What shall I do then with Jesus, that is called 
the Christ?— Matt 27 :22. 

"Nineteen hundred years ago a star poised above a lowly man- 
ger in Bethlehem, and above the moon-lit hills of Judea the angels 
heralded the beginning of the life of Christ upon this earth, who 
came to teach us the religion of human kindness and brotherly 
love. No matter what He said or did, the Jews spurned and re- 
pudiated his claims to be the Messiah, and they cursed and blas- 
phemed. They spat upon Him and cursed Him, and they drove 
Him from town to town, and their enmity finally culminated in 
the greatest tragedy that the world has ever looked upon — the 
murder of Jesus Christ. 

"But before that was enacted several incidents took place from 
one of which I take my text tonight. And next to Jesus the most 
important personage that appears upon the stage of action, is 
Pilate. And from his lips I take my text. It was he who asked : 
'What shall I do then with Jesus who is called the Christ?' 

"Pilate made one of the greatest, most stupendous, gigantic, 
ignominious failures that the world has ever looked upon. No 
man ever had a better chance to show his manhood than he — a 
better chance to earn fame — no man ever did a thing that stamps 
him less a man until his name today is the stench when mentioned, 
and we turn with disgust and place him side by side with Judas, 
for they, of all men, to my mind, showed the greatest lack of man- 
hood, decency, or courage, the world has ever gazed upon. 

"Now Pilate had many things to encourage him— so have you 
— and he had many things to discourage him — so have you. When 
God brings his influence to bear to get you to decide favorably 
for Jesus, all hell is at work to prevent you from doing what you 
know is right, and the manly thing to do. Now Pilate had many 
things to encourage him and many things to discourage him. 
First, to help him, he had the dream of his wife. I do not know 
who Mrs. Pilate was before her marriage. The story of her is 
very briefly told in the Bible. It is all summed up in one verse. 



Rev. Wm, A. (Billy) Sunday 257 

So I don't know who she was before her marriage. Neither are 
we informed what kind of a woman she was after her marriage, 
only it is suggested by this incident. It is no real evidence of 
her womanly qualities or enduring indication of goodness or vir- 
tue simply because God revealed himself in a dream to Pharoah, 
and to Nebuchadnezzar, and it is no evidence of Mrs. Pilate's 
virtuous womanhood; and yet for all you know she might have 
been very devout and constantly on the alert to save her husband 
from the difficulties of his position into which his pliable and 
plastic disposition would lead him. It might have been her love. 
Her dream was an unpleasant one. While she slumbered God, 
in some way, revealed something to her. I am sure that he re- 
vealed to her that her husband was about to mix up with the 
greatest tragedy that the world has ever known, and she sent the 
message : 

" 'Have thou nothing to do with this just man. If others want 
to murder him, let them do it. But Pilate, husband, don't you 
redden your hands with his blood, or mix with that godless rabble 
clamoring for his blood.' 

"He had his wife's dream and advice. She did all that she 
could to keep her husband on the right side, and you are to be 
congratulated with that kind of a wife. Many a man is married 
to a mill-stone. If it were not for her he would amount to some- 
thing in the world. But it is unfortunate to have a wife who is a 
mill-stone, a barrier, and a damper. 

"He had another thing; he had the personality of Jesus. If you 
brought a man to me as juror, I would say the personality of the 
man that stood before me would enter largely into my attitude 
toward him. Here was Jesus, more beautiful than a dream of 
Pericles, the most magnificent character in history. There he 
stood before Pilate. 

"And he had the miracles of Jesus. I don't know that he had 
ever seen Jesus perform a miracle, but the miracles of Jesus were 
current conversations everywhere. The land was stirred. Every- 
body wanted to see the Nazarene. He had the miracles of Jesus 
— and you have all that. And Pilate knew if he did anything 
to further increase the Jews' enmity his head would not be worth 

17 



258 Life and Labors of 

anything and he would lose his job. And if he would show friend- 
ship for them he would hold his job, and Pilate, in order to curry 
favor with the Jews, would slap Jesus in the face, and do any- 
thing to win favor; and a lot of you fellows will sell your soul 
to the Devil to win the favor of the same old whisky-soaked, 
wizen-eyed, peanut-brained, ward-heeling politician — that is what 
Pilate did — and you do it today. 

"Second, what would Caesar say? Caesar was supreme. His 
word was Law. His every whim would be executed. Now Jesus 
had been proclaimed as their king by some of the Jews, and Pilate 
knew if he showed the slightest friendship to Jesus he would in- 
cur the enmity of Caesar. And would have to walk down from 
the throne. Therefore Pilate thought this all out and in order to 
please the Jews and please Caesar, he was willing to turn Jesus 
Christ over to be murdered. And you in order to please godless 
society, politics, or riffraff, slap Jesus Christ in the face and turn 
from every noble conviction that you ought to yield to. You are 
doing it every day. Never mind what society says. You do 
what is right and manly. 

"Pilate. What a miserable failure he made. He had influence 
to help him and yielded to the interest that damned his soul. Pi- 
late, had often heard of Jesus and often longed for the opportunity 
for Jesus to appear before him. He longed for the chance to pass 
sentence and I often imagine the look of surprise on his face 
when Jesus walked into his presence. And just then the messen- 
ger dashed in with the message from Mrs. Pilate. Pilate turned 
to Jesus and said : 

" 'Art thou the Son of God ?' Jesus said : 'I am.' 

"Jesus Christ was the Son of God or He was a liar. Jesus 
Christ was the Son of God or He was an imposter. Jesus Christ 
was the Son of God or He was a bastard, the illegitimate offspring 
of a Jewish harlot, for He was born out of wedlock. He was 
either conceived by the Holy Ghost, and the Son of God, or He 
was a bastard, a fraud and fake, the biggest fake that ever 
breathed. And I despise your Unitarian doctrine which makes 
Jesus just a good man. My mother taught me that a good man 
does not lie. How can Jesus be a good man and a liar at the 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 259 

same time. The Bible is either the word of God or a lie. Then 
to perdition with the doctrine that Jesus was only a good man. 
I would hate to make out my judge up yonder a bastard down 
here. 

"He said : 'Art thou the Son of God ?' Pilate called for a basin 
of water and walked out before the rabble and said: 'I find no 
fault with him. I wash my hands of his blood.' And he stepped 
down before the crowd and washed his hands. If he had washed 
his heart he would have been a clean man. 

"There has come from across the sea a book, 'Letters from 
Hell,' and in that book Pilate is represented in the lost world (this 
is another fool novel idea) and he is bending over a stream of 
water into which he dips his hands. (A stream of water in hell 
is the limit according to my theology — I say there is another fool 
novel idea — everybody has a little fool idea about religion.)' So 
Pilate is represented in the lost world dipping his hands into a 
stream of water, and some one touches him on the shoulder and 
says : 

" 'What is the matter, Pilate?' and he, with an awful look of 
agony, cries : 'Will they never be clean ?' 'Jesus Christ can make 

them ' 'No; — they were red on earth and in hell/ and 

the blood is on you and will stay there to damn you in hell if you 
don't accept Jesus Christ? Pilate had not the courage of his con- 
victions. He was convinced that Christ was right and the Jews 
were wrong, and his claims true. But if Pilate had said of Jesus : 
'He is right; I will stand by Him, if I die, and you cannot kill 
Him as long as I sit on the throne' — he would have taken his 
stand among the greatest characters that the world ever brought 
forth. 

"If he had taken the crown of thorns and put it on his own 
head and taken his robes and wrapped them about the form of 
Jesus and said, 'Nail me to the cross, but let Jesus go/ he would 
have walked with the grandest company in the world. He did 
not have the courage of his convictions, nor have you. You are 
convinced that it is wrong not to be a Christian, but you have not 
the courage of your conviction and the manhood and the courage 
to walk down the aisles and take your stand with Jesus Christ. 



260 Life and Labors of 

And therefore you are in the same company with Pilate. He 
knew, but die had not the courage, and you know and you have 
not the courage to do it. 

"There was old Herod. As soon as Pilate heard that Herod 
was in town he sent Jesus over to him, because Jesus was a Gal- 
ilean and came under the dominion of Herod. Herod thought 
'that Jesus was a magician and that he went round performing 
little miracles. A sort of sleight of hand performer, and he asked 
Jesus to perform a few tricks to entertain him, but Jesus an- 
swered him never a word. 

"And they sent him back to Pilate. Herod had made a miser- 
able failure of his life — Herod was the man that went out to hear 
John the Baptist, and I can see him as he went back to his palace, 
for John told him : 'You are an old adulterer. You have no right 
to have your brother Philip's wife.' I can see him troubled. He 
would like to have had his brother's wife, and Christ at the same 
time. And you can't have both, sin and Christ, and he wanted 
to compromise. I am convinced that the very instant you are 
ready to forsake every known sin that instant God will accept you, 
but you cannot compromise the proposition. 

"What are you going to do with the Christ of your mother? 
What are you going to with the Christ of your wife ? The Christ 
of your children? What are you going to do with him? Listen 
to me ; north, south, east and west, my friends, up will come mul- 
titudes. 

"Then, then, then, there, there, there on the right hand of God, 
will be Jesus Christ, whom I shall present tonight. 

"I can see the Devil there accusing us before the Father, I can 
see him grapple and wrap a thong around their bodies and drag- 
ging them away. I can see God rise from his throne and say : 
'Hey, let that man go. He has an advocate with the Father in 
Jesus Christ, His son.' God loves him and he will say, *let him 
go/ The angels' choir, tier upon tier, will in one great voice 
sing: Turn him loose; let him go; he has an advocate with the 
Father.' And then the Devil will turn back and go down into the 
nethermost depth of that dark pit, hell, and up from that infernal 
region below he will belch and puff sulphur fumes, and you will 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 261 

hear their hopeless wail : 'Lost, lost, lost. We have no advocate 
with the Father.' 

" 'Lost. What shall we do then ?' Say, you can damn Billy 
Sunday and sneer at him; and you can cuss me and cuss Jesus 
Christ and cuss the Bible, but, ha, ha, you sinner, I have got you 
beat. What shall we do with my Jesus ? I have got you beat, old 
Decatur brewery, I have got you beat. Listen. What will you 
do? What will you do? I tell you if you accept Jesus, God 
accepts you. If you don't He will turn you down, turn you down. 
What will you do? If you accept Jesus, God will instantly take 
you. If you refuse Jesus, God will instantly refuse you. He will 
have nothing to do with you if you don't take Jesus as your 
Savior. 

"In the Bank of England there is a machine of marvelous 
mechanism for weighing gold sovereigns. They don't take the 
gold for the face value in England, but they take it by its weight. 
The value shrinks away by passing through the fingers. 
The machine never varies a millionth part of an ounce. So mar- 
velous is the balance of that machine that a breath turns the scale. 
They keep it in a glass case to keep the air from it. A man drops 
the coins in a tray that slides them into the scale. If the coin is 
full standard weight it tips to the right. If it is a fraction of a hair 
short it tips to the left. It never varies. The marvelous machine 
saves the bank of England hundreds of thousands of pounds every 
year. 

"But marvelous as is this machine it is nothing compared to the 
scrutiny you have got to pass through when you meet Jesus Christ. 
All your social attainments, all your money, all that don't matter 
with Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Money don't count if you 
don't believe in Jesus Christ. What will you do with Jesus Christ? 
What will you do with Jesus ? You will go to the right or to the 
left as you answer. You must accept of Jesus Christ and be 
born again if you wish to get into the Kingdom of Heaven— you 
will never get there if you are not. Listen, God is speaking to you. 
What will we do with Jesus, then ? I never preach along this line, 
but I feel my frightful inadequacy. I try to forget myself and 
think of Christ. 



262 Life and Labors of 

"There are three reasons that you ought to have for accepting 
jesus Christ. You should be with Him because of the glory and 
beauty and perfection of His character. I am at a loss to know 
what to tell you. 

"Does Jesus Christ lack anything in your estimation? Some 
infidel said: 'Find me an absolutely perfect character and I 
will worship him.' I challenge the world to find just one flaw 
in Jesus Christ, and He stands out tonight more magnificently and 
purer than ever. 'What shall I do with Jesus?' You ought to 
have to do with Him because of the glory of His character. 

"Second, you ought to have to do with Him because the love 
that all pure and holy bear Him. An anarchist don't like Him; 
nihilists don't like Him; a bomb thrower has no use for Him; 
a thief has no use for Him ; a holdup man has no use for Him ; 
an absconder has no use for Him; an embezzler has no use for 
Him. Only the riffraff of God's dirt have no use for one whom 
you ought to do with because of the love that all the pure and 
holy bear Jesus Christ. Look how they love Him up in heaven. 
When God sent Him down the angels could not bear to see Him 
come alone and followed Him. And the shepherds watching 
their flocks at night heard that heavenly song: 'Glory to God in 
the highest, peace on earth and good will to men.' I can see 
Him being baptized by John in the river Jordan, and God the 
Father stepped out on the threshold and leaning over the bat- 
tlements cried down: 'This is my beloved Son, hear ye Him.' 
See how God loved Him, see how the angels loved Him. Don't 
you think the world ought to love Him when those who are up 
there in heaven love Him? What will you do with Him? 

"Edward I. was a Christian. Blackstone, the old English law 
commentator, was a Christian. Gladstone was a Christian. Bis- 
marck was a Christian. Queen Victoria was a Christian. No 
man has ever been anything in history who has not been a Chris- 
tian. Grant who was honored as no man ever has been in history 
by the nations when he went around the world, when he was in 
Jerusalem they proposed a feast to him. He said: 'No; not in 
Jerusalem where Jesus Christ, my Savior, suffered and died. This 
is not time nor place for a feast, but I want to get alone and 
weep.' 



. Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 263 

"At the battle of San Juan Hill an American soldier fell 
wounded. The Krag and Mauser bullets were singing their death 
song. After the smoke had blown away the soldier raised his 
hand and waved it. A cowboy from Arizona, a rough-rider, 
turned to Roosevelt and said, 'I will save him.' 'No, no,' said the 
leader. 'You will be cut to pieces by the bullets. I expect he is 
dead/ 

"The American soldier raised his head and feebly waved his 
hand and Jack, the Arizona cowboy, said 'Look, Colonel, he is 
alive. I will go out and get him/ He threw down his Krag and 
threw up his arms in front of his face as if to shield him from 
the bullets. But great God, what protection would that be to 
steel bullets that will travel three miles and go through 32 inches 
of wood? He rushed out and grasped his comrade and started 
back. Just as he went over the hill a bullet struck him above the 
heart. He staggered and dropped his comrade and the blood 
spurted from his nose and dripped from his eyes and ears and 
trickled down his cheeks. He said: 'I am hard hit, comrade. 
I am hit hard. I wish you well.' And with the gurgle of death 
in his throat he fell dead. 

"If Jesus Christ should start down that aisle, I would leap over 
all the seats and run over to Him and fall at His feet, and I 
would say: 'Jesus, command me and I will go. I will do what 
you command. Save me for my wife and save me for my children 
and humanity.' " 

Mr. Sunday's Evening Prayer 

"Jesus, we have tried hard to preach about you; the best that 
we could do would be but a poor effort compared to what you 
would have us do. How hard we preachers try to preach, how 
hard the singers try to sing, how hard the musicians try to play, 
all about your love, and about your goodness, Jesus, but we are 
all doing the best we know how, Lord, the best we can do. 
But it is all a discord of voices and grates on your nerves. How 
weak the human tongue is to speak and sing of thy goodness. 

"But, Jesus, we are trying our best to speak and sing and do 
what we can for you. May the school children of these noble men 



264 Life and Labors of 






and women of Decatur, old and young, come and take my hand 
and take a stand for Christ. Come on, young men, and school 
boys and girls of the University; come on, barbers, come on 
bakers, come on bankers, come on editors, come on reporters, 
come on railroad men, come on Mueller factory employees, come 
on telephone girls, come on Powers office force, come on Millikin 
Bank, and Decatur National Bank, and Citizens Bank and Bur- 
rows & Co., come on Decatur hotel and St. Nicholas hotel, and 
yield to Jesus Christ. 

"Come on Traction company superintendents, come on rail- 
road superintendents, come on train dispatchers, come on yard 
foreman, come on master mechanic, and yield to Jesus Christ. 
Come on farmer, come on washer woman, old and young, rich 
and poor, boys and girls, come on and take my Jesus. He loves you 
and has done all this to save you from hell. Take Jesus Christ 
and go to heaven. 

"Don't turn Him down, He don't like it. Don't you listen to 
the Devil. I know he is out there saying to you, 'You can't hold 
out.' Don't listen to him. Ingersoll listened to the Devil, he is in 
hell. Huxley listened to the Devil, he is in hell. Voltaire and 
Spencer listened to the Devil and they are in hell. Help, help, 
help, I beseech of you, Lord, to come to this great audience of 
men and women who have left their homes and their offices and 
their shops and their stores, and laid aside their instruments of 
labor and toil to come and accept God. Can't you help them, 
Jesus ? 

"May the spirit of God fill every man in this great audience 
tonight, to stand up and publicly accept Jesus Christ. May every 
man and woman know what to do. While our heads are bowed 
you just lift your hand and say, 'put my name in your prayer.' " 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 265 



EVENING ADDRESS TO MASONS 

"I want to say a word of welcome to the Masons, and the 
auxiliary, the Eastern Star. I suppose the Masonic Lodge is the 
oldest lodge in existence, although some dispute it, most other 
organizations are patterned in a large degree from the Masonic 
order. You know the tenets of Masonry are brotherly love, 
relief, and truth. These three things you are supposed to prac- 
tice in life. 

"First, brotherly love regards the whole human race as broth- 
ers of one family, high, low, rich and poor, black and white. Paul 
says: 'We are all of one blood.' Although by some folks you 
would think we were made of some other kind of stuff ; but that is 
wrong. We are all created by one God. But of course, we are 
not all children of God. I might split with you there. 

"But we are all made of one blood, and God is our creator, 
and then the direct attributes of truth we all believe, is the founda- 
tion of every virtue, and to be good in truth is the first lesson a 
Mason is ever taught; but a whole lot of them are like a whole 
lot of other brothers, they don't deliver the goods. 

"I know the word of God is given as the rule to guide your 
faith. The 24-gauge you have teaches noble and glorious truth, 
and shows how you divide every day into 24 hours and three parts 
of 8 hours each. Eight hours are supposed to be given to the 
worship of God, but how many of you do that? Eight hours to 
worship and helping the distressed and relieving the poor. That is 
what you are expected to do. Eight hours for your usual business 
pursuits, and eight for rest and recreation. Well, that is a good 
division — if you will keep it. I am afraid some pass God up. 
Then you know the Masons regard the Bible as a Rule of Law 
and Life. 

"I believe you never looked into the face of a man that has 
more friends among the various secret orders than I have, although 
I have never been raised from a dead level to the living perpendic- 
ular, or never traveled the hot sands. You were taught to observe 
the duties you owe to God, and neighbor, and self, and this mag- 



266 Life and Labors of 

nificent truth is right out of the Word of God. Therefore there 
is nothing greater, and I am glad to welcome you as men and 
members of the organization, among which I have so many 
friends. I am not a member of any secret order, but I have been 
privileged to help more men in the secret orders to Christ than 
any man that ever stood, perhaps, before a Decatur audience. 
I have never forgotten a man in Aledo, the Worshipful Master 
of the Masonic order there. He came to hear me right along. 
He was a noble fellow, clean in every way but made no profes- 
sion of religion. And one night he came down and took a stand 
for God. And he brought twenty-two Masons to Jesus and 
eight of them were Mystic Shriners. And what a help he has 
been. So I want to bid you welcome. I am not a member of any 
lodge although I covet earnestly the appreciation and friendship 
of all lodge men, and I count on your friendship. And if there is 
any lodge on earth that ought to be back of a great campaign like 
this it is the lodge that wears the trowel, the square and the com- 
pass. He can not do anything less than be what he preaches. He 
cannot give it the cold shoulder and be a man. So I am glad to 
welcome you here tonight, I assure you. 

Mr. Sunday took his text — II. Samuel 12:13: "And David 
said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord, and Nathan 
said unto David, the Lord hath put away thy sin. Thou shalt not 
die." 

"This is a part of one of the saddest statements that I can find 
penned on the pages of the Old Testament. I always read it with 
conflicting emotions — one is the feeling of satisfaction and assur- 
ance in the authenticity and inspiration of the Bible, for if man had 
written the Bible we never would have been told the story of 
man's sins, but when God writes the history of men He puts it 
all in. God does not skim and put in the light and throw away 
the dark. God puts in the blackness, not that He is anxious to 
parade the shortcomings of human nature. God does it because 
He wants to show you and me that men and women in other ages 
transgressed His law and He granted pardon and forgiveness. 
What He has done He will do, for there is not a sin and a com- 
mand that man did not break, and God forgave men for doing 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 267 

that. And God made public record of it, so therefore, if you find 
yourself a slave to similar sins, there is the encouragement for 
you, if you have the manhood to turn from your sin. 

"So it is not a question of who you are and what you are but 
the whole question is : Are you willing to forsake and to turn from 
your sin ? And according to God's word I can stand here tonight 
and offer you pardon full and free. But if you are unwilling to 
turn from your sin I can stand here upon the authority of God's 
word and tell you that hell and eternal damnation will be your 
portion. And so I read this verse with two emotions — if man 
had been writing the Bible or if man had written or compiled the 
Bible he never would have told you that Noah got drunk or that 
David committed adultery or that Solomon had 400 more wives 
than Brigham Young, that Ananias and Sapphira lied and that 
Peter cursed and that Judas was a traitor. If man had been writ- 
ing he never would have told you these things, but left it out. 

"But when God inspired man to write history he put in all of it. 
Know then that if you read the history of Robert Burns, if you read 
his biography you will never be told that Robert Burns once said : 
'If there was a cannon in that corner and a jug of whisky in that 
corner and I was told that if I took the whisky they would fire 
the cannon, I would have to go.' 

"Man won't tell that Tom Marshall died in the streets of 
Louisville a drunken sot, and that he walked the streets one time 
and stopped in front of a blacksmith shop where the blacksmith 
was handling a hot piece of metal and said: 'If I knew that it 
would take away the appetite for drink I would hold that piece 
of iron until it cooled, and sing the doxology.' 

"But there was a time when he could have quit and when 
he could he would not, and when he would he could not, and he 
died, and they wrapped him in a borrowed sheet and the coffin 
was given by charity and the grave was dug by charity. When 
man writes history he leaves out the black things and God puts 
it in. 

"And there is a feeling of sadness to tie to man and be disap- 
pointed. There is many a wife who amid the perfume of orange 
blossoms has received the good wishes of friends, and tonight 



268 Life and Labors of 

hangs her head in shame for the man whose name she bears 
because he has proved an iconoclast and put a stain upon the name 
and done all that is repulsive until she withdraws from society 
and lives an isolated life. Many a mother meditates upon the 
future. She had builded high hopes for her children and has 
expected to see her baby grow to manhood and the family name 
lifted high. She has expected to see her girl by virtue leave the 
misty valleys and climb the sunlit hills of virtue and womanhood ; 
but they have trampled the family name beneath their feet and it 
is synonymous with iniquity, until she blushes to think that she 
ever gave them birth. 

"It is a sad thing to be disappointed in somebody; of all the 
agonies that wring the heart — of all creation — it is to be disap- 
pointed in somebody that you had banked your life upon. 

"Think of the man that could write the 23rd Psalm, which 
Beecher said was the Nightingale Psalm. And every time I read 
that David seems to lift me so high that I can almost hear the 
rustle of the garments of Jesus Christ as He sweeps by me in 
faith. Then he turns and drags the name of God in filth up and 
down the earth. Think of that man that the Bible tells us was 
a man after God's own heart. But said an old skeptic to me: 
Tf David was a man after God's heart, I must say that I have 
not very much respect for the choice of God.' 

"David was not the choice of God because he sinned, no more 
than you are, but because when he sinned he had the manhood 
to acknowledge that he had sinned and to turn away from it. And 
you have not the manhood, but if you do you will become a man 
after God's own heart. That is why he was a man after God's 
own heart, because, when he was wrong he was willing to be 
right. That is more than you are willing to do. You are wrong 
and you know it and seem to glory in the shame. It was a great 
sin for David, greater for David than for many others. Guilt 
is graduated by light, the greater the light the greater the guilt 
— so I think that it was worse for David because God takes into 
account man's opportunities and surroundings. 

"No man or woman on God's dirt will see God unless he is born 
again— the rich, the poor, the black and the white. I don't care 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday • 269 

who you are. You say you are a banker. I don't care a rap. 
You say you are president of a railroad. I don't care a rap. 
Y'ou say you are the biggest tax payer in Macon county. I don't 
care a rap. You'll go to hell unless you repent of your sins. 

"You'll go to hell unless you repent of your sins. It is every- 
body. None is immune. All must come in Jesus' name. 

" Well,' somebody says, mow can I tell what to do ?' 

"Righteousness is born of God. So do what God says. When 
you get home get your Bible and read and learn what to do. 
Do what God says ; read the Bible, and do what that says. I tell 
you you must be born of God. Here is a man who has been a booze- 
fighter for twenty-five years. Come, and take a stand for Jesus 
Christ. He may live two months or five years, and possibly not 
sin, and in an unguarded moment may take a drink and go down. 
What is he going to do ? 

"God shows him what to do. Confess his sins, and God will 
forgive him ; that is what a man must do. God does not say 
never commit a sin. But He says don't make a sin a daily practice 
of your life. A man must be born of God. I never saw a man sin 
that was not sorry and repentant. Say, I won't go on sinning 
every day. 

"You know the difference between a hog and a sheep. A hog 
loves mud, to a sheep it is repulsive. A hog falls in the mud and 
he will lay there and wallow. You let a sheep fall in the mud 
and he will get out as quickly as he can. It is hard work to get 
a sheep in the mud if he can avoid it. A hog loves it. The world 
can tell whether you are a hog or a sheep. 

"You must be born of God. Oh, but, say, what inelegant lan- 
guage. Sister, you are not posted on the Bible. Jesus talks of the 
sow that was washed. Some of you folks when you are washed, 
turn and go right back in the mud. A dog goes back and licks 
up his vomit. 

"That was the Bible I am quoting to you. Some of you people 
turn away from your whisky bottle and go right back to it and 
lick up the same old slop. You turn away from adultery and go 
back and live in sin. 

"What you want to do is to get the hog out of you and you 



270 Life and Labors of 

won't have to carry slop to him. You get out of it and you won't 
have to carry the swill. Come to the Lord and you fellows will 
stop drinking booze and you won't have to slop the hog.. You 
will want water, the Water of Life, and not booze, and the Deca- 
tur Brewery products. You will want something decent. 

"You must be born of God. God loves everybody whether 
white or black. He loves his friends. God loves everybody. 

"A friend of mine told me that down in Brooklyn, New York, 
a church was receiving members into full membership. They 
came to the part in the services where the pastor in the church, 
that was a Baptist church, said: 'All who are willing to extend 
the right hand of fellowship to these people, stand up.' Everyone 
in the church arose except one woman. She was a rich, proud, 
haughty, self-willed, self-centered, Godless church member. 'I 
looked up and said : "Why, aren't you going to rise and thereby 
say you will extend the right hand of fellowship to the new 
members?" She looked at me with a haughty manner and said: 
"Me extend the right hand of fellowship to these people? No 
I will not. They are from the Mission station, and I am not going 
to rise and give the right hand of fellowship to them.' " 

"That miserable huzzy, professed to be a follower of Jesus 
Christ. Take a lot of people like that and figure how long it 
will take to bring the world to Jesus Christ, and wonder why the 
chasm between the poor man and church is so wide and deep. 

"If they are born of God they will overcome the world. But 
if they are not born of Christ the world will overcome them. 
If the world is overcoming you, you are not born of God, but if 
you are born of God you will overcome the world. 

"Explain to me if you are born of God, why you go to a leg 
show, two or three nights a week, and must have your little drink 
of whisky before you go down to breakfast. Why will you do 
these things? If you are born of God, you will overcome the 
world. That is the text by which the world finds out whether you 
are a Christian. Do what God wants. 

"That was a great sin for David. And why ? He sinned against 
life. He knew better. 

"There isn't a man or woman here tonight who sins who doesn't 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 271 

know better. There is not a man here tonight who doesn't know 
better than to sin. There isn't a man here tonight who doesn't 
know the vile sins that control the life of men, and if he will only 
submit to God and have faith in Jesus Christ, he may be saved. 
You know what sin you are a slave to, and God will help you 
overcome it if you will give him a chance. He is forgiving and 
generous. Come to God and he will make you sober and make 
you hate booze. He will make you hate it and hate a drink. 
It will make you cry when you stop and think what you are. 
God will give you strength to overcome that if you will only sub- 
mit to Him. Why don't you do that? 

"I read in the Associated Press dispatch of a man in New 
York who was arrested. In the morning when the drunken stupor 
passed off he said to the turnkey: 'What am I charged with.' 
He said: 'Man, you are charged with murder.' He said: 'For 
God's sake, don't tell my wife; it will kill her.' The jailer said: 
'Why man, it is your wife you have killed.' There wasn't a law- 
yer in New York City that had a brighter prospect than he had. 

"I see men right here tonight that would give their right arm to 
get rid of that appetite. You can if you are ready and willing 
to accept Jesus Christ. God will make you free. I don't care 
what your sins are. When you sin you are not only hurting your- 
self but you are hurting your wife and you are hurting your chil- 
dren. 

"Since I have been in Decatur I have said, 'Who is that boy?' 
'His name is so-and-so, and his father is such-and-such a man, and 
that boy has to walk the streets of Decatur with the finger of 
scorn pointed at him, not for anything that he has done, but 
because of the sin of his father.' I have said, 'Who is that girl ?' 
'She is so-and-so, and her mother is such-and-such a woman, and 
that girl must live in this town ostracised and stigmatized, not for 
anything that she has done but because of the life of her mother,' 
So when you sin you hurt your wife and your children and your 
mother and everybody tied to you by the bonds of blood and fam- 
ily name. It hurts the manhood and the womanhood. 

"David sinned against the people of his kingdom and what 
an effect it had upon their lives. I wish when you go home 



2.J2. Life and Labors of 

tonight you would read the 51st Psalm written by David. If I 
would ask the definitions for repentance, how many different 
answers would I get? 

"Well, you are sorry you sinned. No, no, there isn't a man in 
the penitentiary that is not sorry that he sinned. Is he sorry 
because he is a criminal? No. Is he sorry because he broke the 
laws of the state of Illinois and of God? No, he is simply sorry 
because he got caught. He would do it again if he thought he 
would not have to go to jail. 

"That isn't repentance. What is it? I read here it isn't con- 
viction. I know a man in Decatur so convicted of sin that he can 
hardly rest. I know business men, traveling men and young men 
and women so convicted of sin that they can scarcely eat ; so con- 
victed of sin that they can hardly sleep. I know it and so do they. 
I have had them come to me with tears trickling down their 
cheeks and say, T am a member of a church and I am not living 
right.' Every day since I have been here I have had them come 
to me here in town. It isn't conviction, it isn't remorse. Judas 
had no such remorse that he committed suicide. 

"Down in Troy, New York, a young man leaped to his feet and 
cried: 'Remorse, remorse, remorse.' A few days later he was 
found dead in a gutter. It is not remorse. 

"How hard people try to cover up their sins. There is one 
verse in the Scripture I would like to emblazon all over Decatur. 
I would like to set it above the St. Nicholas hotel. I would like 
to set it on top of the Decatur hotel. I would like to tack it on 
the tower of the court house, and I would like to set it on the 
electric light towers of this city, and I would like to hire men j 
to carry it around the city on signs. This is the verse : 'Be sure 
your sins will find you out.' 

"I would like to paint it on the farmer's barn like they do Bull 
Durham smoking tobacco. I would like to paint it on the sign- 
board. I would like to scatter it all over the land. 'Be sure your 
sins will find you out.' Then when you had read it, turn your 
thoughts in upon yourself until they have knocked your knees. 
If we confess our sins He is faithful and just in forgiving us and 
clean all unrighteous lives. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 273 

"I never understood Him until 20 years ago when I staggered 
home to Jesus Christ in Chicago, and between God and me were 
my sins. I said: 'God, for Christ's sake, forgive my sins. Cast 
them behind my back.' I can't see what is behind my back. He 
will cast them to the deepest depths of the sea and remind you of 
them no more. 

"When man accepts Jesus Christ God never digs up the past and 
brings them around and shakes them in your face. He will not 
remind you like a man that will remind you that you used to swear 
when you don't now. He will not remind you that you used to 
drink when you don't now. A man who will dig up your past is 
too dirty and low down for you to speak to, or look at, and I 
would not disgrace a polecat by comparing it with him. God 
says: 'I will remember your sins against you no more forever.' 
God won't do it, then why sin? Why do you do it? 

" William Reynolds, did any of you ever know him? He used 
to live at Peoria. One time Major McClaughrey, warden of the 
Joliet penitentiary, said: 'Reynolds, I want you to come up a 
certain day (and he named the day) and talk to the prisoners. 
Don't fail to come for if you do you will regret it all your life.' 

"On the day selected, Reynolds was there. He had spoken to 
the prisoners and when he got through, Major McClaughrey 
walked to the front of the platform and said: 'I have a pardon 
for one man.' 

"Reynolds said every prisoner had to sit upright with his 
arms folded and when Major McClaughrey made that announce- 
ment every man in the house broke the rule. They leaned for- 
ward and grasped the back of the seat in front of them, eyes and 
mouth agape, listening and looking. 

"McClaughrey said : 'It is a pardon for a life prisoner/ Rey- 
nolds said to him: 'Tell them quick, I will die with suspense, 
and I am not a prisoner in the state of Illinois. I can walk down 
to that door and say to the doorkeeper, open the door, I want to 
go out, and he will have to do it. I can walk out and they can't 
stop me. I am not a prisoner. These men are, tell them quick.' 

"The Major said : 'The pardon is for William Johnson.' Not 
a convict moved. He repeated the name again and then he re- 






274 Life and Labors of 

membered the prisoners were known only by number. He then 
repeated the number. Away back in the middle of the section 
a man rose and came down the aisle. Standing in front of the 
platform he said: 'Major, is that for me. Number so-and-so?' 
'Yes,' said the Major, 'the pardon is for you.' 

"The tears rolled down the man's cheeks like a river of water. 
He said : 'My God, can it be true ? I have looked for it for 22 
years and my wife is dead, my children are gone, my mother is 
gone. I walk out of this place and there is not a face I know.' 

"He dropped to the seat weeping. When the convicts started 
to walk out with the lock-step, Johnson, as the huge line swept 
like a serpent in front of him, arose, and when his place came he 
stepped into line. 

"The Major reached down and said, 'Hold on, you are no 
longer a convict. You are a free man. This is an unconditional 
pardon from the governor. Step out of the line/ 

"The tears rolled down his cheeks. 'My God/ he said, 'it can't 
be me.' That is the way men are pardoned by influential men 
securing an executive pardon. 

"I am glad to stand here. Christ said: 'Whosoever will may 
come.' White, black, rich or poor, and partake of the Water of 
Life freely. He cares not what your sins may be if you are ready 
to take my hand and say, T am ready.' Will you do it?" 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 275 



AFTERNOON SERMON (To Men) 

Let the sinner be consumed out of the earth, 
and let the wicked be no more. — Psalm 104 :35. 

"This is a peculiar verse of Scripture, but I did not choose it 
because of that but because it contains a germ of truth that I 
want to develop in my message to you today. There is no verse 
in the Scripture misunderstood or misinterpreted more than that. 
And many a man gives that as his reason for going to hell. 

"When David offered that prayer a fragment of which I have 
chosen for my message today, he said : 'Let the wickedness of the 
wicked come to an end. Let the people keep the law.' If such 
things keep on until the end of time what, in God's name, will this 
land and world of ours come to? David saw the sin and saw 
what it meant. Saw the effect of it on the individual. Saw its 
effect on the community, and he said: 'God, let's settle it.' If 
men want to do right, men want sobriety, men want virtue, men 
want decency. Then may the sinners be consumed out of the 
earth. 

"You have said: 'Why don't God kill that man?' There are 
men that walk the street and leave a slimy trail of iniquity 
and corruption behind them, and you say: 'Why don't God kill 
him?' 

"Death comes and takes some man to an early grave and leaves 
some old libertine of a scoundrel to live. And you say, 'why don't 
God kill him? Why don't he take him?' That is just exactly 
what David meant when he offered that prayer. 

"I sometimes hear men speak like that. They talk about per- 
sonal liberty. Either a man who talks like that don't know what 
he is talking about or his heart is blackened and calloused with 
iniquity. He has lost all respect for God, decency, virtue or he 
would not talk like that. If there was only one sinner I would 
work just as hard for him for others have got to suffer because of 
the iniquity of that one man. If a man staggers home drunk not 
only the man himself suffers but his wife suffers, his children 
suffer and others suffer for his iniquity and indulgence. 



276 Life and Labors of 

" 'Well/ I heard a man say ; 'well, it is nobody's business how 
I live.' 'This is a land of liberty,' they say. A man that says 
that is a low-down, vile, dirty, unmanly, contemptible, 
un-American, low-down, hellish person. Nobody's business. 
It is everybody's business what he does. If you want 
to rape and seduce every girl you see in this world, don't you think 
it is anybody's business ? It is everybody's business. If you think 
it isn't you just bump up against my wife and find out. A man 
has a right to do and go just so far as the arm of the law of God 
and decency and virtue will let him, and if he oversteps that 
power then he loses that right. That is what the whisky gang is 
doing. They are overstepping the law of God. Don't tell me that 
that low-down damnable set have the liberty to make drunkards 
out of men and boys and ruin homes and happiness. You might 
just as well take a blow-gun and blow green peas against a big 
battleship and expect to sink it as to expect that this tidal wave 
is not going to drive the saloon and its damnable business onto 
the rocks. 

"In Chicago there is a gang up there that is sending out letters 
to business men wanting them to fight against the prohibition 
movement that is sweeping the country. Let them fight against it, 
and don't you forget the church of Jesus Christ will fight it to a 
finish. We will fight it in the name of decency and of home. I am 
an American and a tax payer of Illinois, and I have no right or 
personal liberty that does not conform to the laws of God, and no 
other man has. 

"There are three things that will tone any town down and give 
it a bad name. Those three things will keep decent people away 
from it more than any other thing. Here, this is what they are : 

"A lot of swearing, cursing, foul-mouthed men on the street, 
keeping stores open on a Sabbath, and open, licensed saloons. 
I don't care whether it is Decatur, or any other town. They will 
lose their standing if those three things are carried on in their 
city. What do you cuss for ? God said : 'Thou shalt not steal,' 
and stopped. He said: 'Thou shalt not commit adultery,' and 
stopped. He said, 'Thou shalt not bear false witness,' and 
stopped. When he got to swearing he said : 'Thou shalt not take 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 277 

the name of the Lord, thy God, in vain, for the Lord will not hold 
him guiltless who taketh His name in vain.' 

"The Lord knew that a man might under certain circumstances 
steal; but there is absolutely no reason why a man should cuss. 
It isn't a sign of integrity or of manhood. Then why do you 
cuss? I can see where a man can be placed in circumstances 
where he will steal to get food for his starving wife and children. 
I can see where a man would be placed in circumstances to kill 
to save his wife and children. But I cannot see where he could 
be placed in circumstances that he would have to cuss and damn 
God. 

"Here is a man that has got the habit of drinking. He comes 
home one day and finds that his whisky bottle has been touched. 
He says to his wife: 'Have you got some of my whisky?' 'No/ 
He says to the boy: 'Have you been drinking that whisky?' 
'No.' He finds that he has lost some money, and he says to his 
wife : 'Wife, have you been in my pocket and taken some money ?' 
'No.' He says to the boy : 'Have you been in my pants pocket T 
'No.' T had thirty-seven cents and now I have only thirty.' 

"Well, the old man sees an advertisement in the newspaper. 
He sees where a merchant wants a boy. He takes the boy to the 
merchant and the old man says : 'Want a boy ?' 'Yes,' the mer- 
chant says. 'Does he smoke?' 'A little.' 'Chew?' 'Yes.' 
'Drink?' 'Sometimes; he don't get drunk.' 'Does he steal ?' 'Oh, 
yes, a little bit/ T don't want him at all.' 

"Well, he goes over to the lawyer's office. He says the boy 
ought to make a good lawyer with all these habits. He walks into 
the lawyer's office and says : 'Howdy. Want a boy ?' 'Yes. 
Does he smoke cigarettes?' 'Yes.' 'Steal?' 'Yes.' 'Does he 
lie?' 'Oh, yes.' 'Well, I don't want him; take him out of here. 
Do you think I want to disgrace the profession by hiring a good- 
for-nothing like that? Take him out of here. Do you know that 
the United States is run by lawyers? Most of the governors are 
lawyers. Two hundred and fifty-nine out of three hundred 
senators are lawyers. Nineteen of the twenty-five presidents 
have been lawyers. The head of every department in Washing- 
ton is a lawyer. The founders of this country were lawyers. 
Take him away.' 



278 Life and Labors of 

"The old man takes the boy down the street until he comes to 
a sign. S-a-1-o-o-n ; say loon ; that is a pretty good name for it. 
He goes to the bartender and says: 'Do you want a boy?' 'Yes. 
Does he smoke ?' 'Yes.' 'Does he chew ?' 'Yes.' 'Does he steal ?' 
'Yes.' 'Does he drink ?' 'Yes.' 'Well, I don't want him. I don't 
want a boy to stand behind my bar and cuss my customers and 
drink my whisky. I want him to sell it. I don't want him to 
smoke my cigars. They are for sale.' The saloon keeper don't 
want him. 

" 'All right,' says the old man ; T know where I will go. I 
will put the boy in the lodge.' Put him in the lodge. He would 
get the black ball on the first ballot. 

"Do you know that 52 per cent of the Masons are Christians ? 
The Knights of Pythias wouldn't have him. Forty-nine per 
cent of the Knights of Pythias are Christians. Take him to the 
Elks. Why, the Elks wouldn't have him. There is only one 
thing that I have got against the Elks, boys. Take out that bar 
room and you will find that Billy Sunday will stand by you and 
help you all I can. 

"Let the boy accept Jesus Christ and confess his sins then 
the merchant will want him, the lawyer will want him, the Odd 
Fellows will want him, the Woodmen and the Redmen will take 
him, but the saloonkeeper don't want him. I tell you, boys of today 
are going faster than we used. This is a speedy world now. 
When you old fellows came to Illinois you went across the prai- 
rie about two miles an hour and then sometimes you would go in 
relays and then you speeded up to four miles an hour. The 
railways came and you went ten miles an hour, then fifteen miles. 
Today we have got rock-ballasted railroad tracks with 90 pound 
rails, ponderous, triple-expansion 7-foot drivers, and 4-foot trail- 
ers, and vestibule trains, and we are whirled over the hills and 
through the valleys at 50, 60 and 75 miles an hour. 

"We are going at a speedy rate today. I was in Iowa some- 
where coming east. The Burlington and the Northwestern were 
having a contest for carrying the United States mail. For about 
a month the two roads had been running neck and neck. 

"It was in February, that time of the year when it was hard to 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 279 

make the steam. The train came into Preston late. J George 
Goodritch was to carry her through to the Union Pacific transfer 
at Council Bluffs. Goodritch climbed into the cab and while the 
emergency brake was being tested by the big mogul coupled on 
behind, Superintendent Storrs ran over to the engine and shouted : 
'George, the Northwestern mail is on time, and you are 47 minutes 
late. Burn up your time card, for we have given you a clear 
track to the Union Pacific transfer. Put her through on time or 
put her in the ditch.' 

"George didn't answer, but he opened the throttle and the train 
responded instantly. Before he was out of the yards he was trav- 
eling 30 miles an hour. We all got out on the platform of the 
train and I can see the mail today as she came down the track 
towards the station. I caught a glimpse of George Goodritch as 
the train came down, his cap pulled down, his collar pulled up and 
his hands on the throttle, his eyes straight ahead. A slight snow 
had fallen that morning and after one glimpse we could see noth- 
ing on account of the snow that was swirling around the oncoming 
monster. The conductor of the local was standing near me look- 
ing at the train in a dazed sort of way. 

"Turning to him I' shouted: 'My God, Tom, how fast is he 
going?' 'Going? Bill, she is going 80 miles an hour if she is 
turning a wheel. If she ever jumps the track she will go clear 
outside of the right of way.' 

"On and on she tore; she reached the Glenwood hills. I was 
talking to the fireman afterwards and he said : T had loaded her 
firebox full, and when we came to the Glenwood Hill I watched to 
see what George would do. Bill, he let her out two more notches 
as he reached the top and lunged down grade; I just dropped on 
my knees and prayed.' The swaying engine tore on and on. She 
leaped from her rails so far the flanges nearly went outside. She 
slipped her brasses and melted her babbits. And when she rolled 
into the Union Pacific Transfer every wheel was smoking and 
the glasses in the cab were shattered. When the engineer and 
fireman got out of the cab they could hardly walk, but they had 
put her in three minutes ahead of time, and the "Q" is carrying 
the mail today. 



280 Life and Labors of 

"Yes, we are going fast, and your boy is going the same way. 
He is going to follow you either to heaven or to hell. These are 
speedy times. Now you can understand what David meant, 'Let 
the sinner be consumed out of the earth, and let the wicked be no 
more.' 

"Here is a man that drinks. You don't drink. Your boy goes 
over to that man's house to play with their boys. In comes the 
father and he mixes up some hot water and whisky for a little 
toddy. He says to your boy, 'Do you want a little ?' 'No ; father 
don't want me to drink.' 'Ha, ha, damn prohibitionist, I guess. 
Take a little.' 'No ; mother don't want me to drink.' 'Here, you 
are 17 years old. Don't be tied to her apron strings all your life.' 
He persuades the boy to take a drink. By that act he discovers 
that he has an alcoholic appetite, inherited from his great-grand- 
father, and becomes a perpetual drunkard. 

"What you are your children will be. If you were a Christian 
your children are going to be Christians. Ninety out of every 
one hundred boys are like their father. Blood will tell. 

"Jesse Pomeroy was put in the penitentiary when he was 1 1 
years old. You couldn't do that now we have a reform school. 
But he was sent to the penitentiary and has been there nearly 
fifty years. Before he was 11 years old he had taken the life of 
nine of his playmates. He took a little girl out in the woods one 
time and tied her to a tree, cut off her ears, gouged out her eyes, 
cut open her abdomen and took out her intestines and wound 
them around a tree. When asked why he did that he replied: 
'Just to hear her hollow and cry.' 'Did she cry?' T should say 
so,' was the reply. 

"His father was a butcher and his mother used to go down to 
the slaughter house with her husband and help him to kill hogs; 
she learned to cut their throats; she would help skin them and 
clean them, and when this boy was born to her he had the desire 
to kill, cut and shed blood, bred in him. He killed nine of his 
playmates before he was 11 years old. 

"Some of you fellows out there may be so far gone that I can't 
help you. But by the eternal God, if I can't stand here and save 
you, if I can't flag you as we sweep around the curve, I will stand 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 281 

here and pray for the girls, for the manhood and the womanhood 
here in Decatur. I want to help the children and the children of 
tomorrow, the coming generation. 

"I tell you, men of Decatur, and surrounding towns, I tell you 
blood will tell, and I pray in the name of Christ, and all that is 
noble and grand and manly within you, for the sake of your 
mother, your wife and your sister and your children, and the com- 
munity in which you live, and the children yet unborn, to hear me, 
and may God Almighty help you to keep the commandments. I 
pray that God Almighty will come to all of you and you will 
accept Jesus Christ." 



Mr. Sunday's Mighty Prayer 

"Lord, there is lots to do, so help us to do our level best. We 
haven't much ability and what we have is limited. The opportun- 
ities to do, Lord, are great. Help us, Oh, Lord, to impart the 
knowledge we have. 

"Oh, God, put your arms around old Decatur, and the towns 
and surrounding country. Oh, Jesus, we pray save tens of hun- 
dreds of thousands throughout the corn-belt. There is great op- 
portunity here, starting at Galesburg, Kankakee, Gibson City, 
Rantoul, Bloomington. Hear us, oh Lord, help us, we beseech 
three. Help the preachers at Canton to lead many to salvation. 
Hear us, we pray, to do great and wonderful things. Hear us 
and help us to do grand things in this community. In the stores, 
the offices, the shop and in the factory to permeate all walks of 
life to inquire the way to Jesus Christ. We thank Thee for the 
interest in these meetings. 

"We pray Thee, God, for his honor, the mayor of Decatur. 
Coming down to the city council, we pray Thee to save them. We 
beseech Thee, God, to go to the court house and save the county 
officials. Oh, God, save the police department, and don't forget 
the chief and the men on the force. 

"And the firemen, Lord, they roll out of bed in the middle of 
the night or noon, and plow their way through the slush and 
climb the ladders and disappear in the smoke. They go, not know- 



282 Life and Labors of 

ing whether they will return to their waiting wives and children. 
Save the railroad boys and the street car conductors. Help the 
train dispatcher to keep his head and not get balled up and let 
some train in on a side track. 

"Help us to do great and wonderful things. Sweep through the 
lodges, the Masons, for they have a great crowd here. The Odd 
Fellows, the Knights, the Woodmen, the Elks, the Redmen and 
the Labor Unions. We pray, oh, God, for the bricklayers' union, 
the carpenters' union, the engineers, the firemen, the switchmen. 

"And finally coming to the newspapers, Lord, we pray for the 
editor and on down to the devil in the office, and the newsy on the 
street, and the reporters here that are making up such fine reports 
of these meetings. Up and down the land, Lord, they are spread- 
ing the news of these grand meetings. And I expect they are get- 
ting cussed for giving so much space to the meetings. But many 
people are anxious to know and show their appreciation of what 
is being done. Lord bless them. 

"And, God, don't forget the musicians of the musician's union. 
Bless them, and the choir, the ushers and the preachers whom we 
have learned to love, and the Sunday school teachers, and the Mil- 
likin university, the faculty and the student body, and the grade 
schools and the high school. 

"And we pray for the lawyers, and that is a bunch that cer- 
tainly needs help. And then the doctors, help them for they are 
asked to do so many dirty things under cover. Bless the hotel 
keepers from the proprietors down to the bell hops. The chamber 
maids, help them and the dining-room girls, we beseech Thee to 
save them. Hear us, oh God ; the delivery boys and the good fel- 
lows who carry the mail and ring the door bells and bring us let- 
ters of love, joy and sorrow ; bless them, we pray Thee. And we 
beseech Thee, oh God, to help the bankers. Go through the offices, 
the shops, the stores; and the clerks. The telephone girls, how 
kind they are to connect us whenever we want them. Lord, we 
pray for them. Lord, there are so many that need help. There 
are so many that need help we want to put our arms around them 
and throw them at your feet. 

"And, say, hold on Lord. Don't forget the saloon keepers and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 283 

the bartenders and the brewers. I hate the cussed business. I 
just despise it from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet. 
Every hair in my head, every molecule, every corpuscle, nerve, 
tissue, vein, artery, toenail, fingernail, eyes, eyelashes, and every 
bit of gray matter in my head. God, I hate the whisky business, 
but I would like to see the saloon keeper saved, and the brewer, 
too, Lord. And oh, Lord, help the gamblers to get out of that busi- 
ness ; and hear us, God, and save the girls down in the red-light 
district, merchandising their womanhood. God, that is an awful 
business ; help the poor girls who are down there. And the booze- 
fighters : God help them to get on the water wagon. And the 
highway robber and the thief. 

"Oh, Lord, what joy there would be if the golden chariot should 
roll down the streets of Decatur — and say, 'Come on, banker, 
lawyer and doctor, and clerk, and telephone girl, and firemen, and 
hotel keeper, and railroad boys, and Mueller factory men, and 
the girls in the office, and the girls in the telephone room, and the 
student in the High School room, and the teachers and their schol- 
ars in the grade school, old and decrepit men and women. Get 
on board, climb on the old ship of Zion, come on, we are going 
home to glory/ for the Lord says : 'I want you to come.' And I 
would like to see you here. Bless us, Lord, in the name of 
Jesus Christ whom we have never seen but whom we have learned 
to love." 



Evening Prayer 

"Well, Jesus, we are sorry that we were ever sinners. Sorry 
that we ever lived in a half hearted sort of way for you. Jesus, 
how unsatisfactory it has been to us and how disgusting it has 
been to the world. Jesus, we do not want to have any half- 
hearted business. We know that you don't and the world don't. 
It is not satisfactory in any place in life, but surely not in the 
church.. We want to be out-and-out for Thee. Just show us 
ourselves that we may weep and cry and groan. Then show us 
a glimpse of Thyself that we can rest in the forgiveness which 
is to be found only through faith in the redemption offered through 



284 Life and Labors of 

Jesus Christ. Hear us, our blessed Redeemer. Hear us, we be- 
seech Thee, this night. 

"Here are men and women — days come and days go — and 
they are born and they die. There is happiness in the home — no 
newly-made graves in the family lot, no empty chair in the home, 
no empty garments in the wardrobe, and when the father comes 
home from the office and the store he sees the little faces framed 
in the window bidding him welcome home. And yet, God, he 
don't love Thee, and has denied Thee. Yet he don't want the 
white hearse to come. He don't want you to speak, God, — and 
you can speak, and if you did he would throw his hands and fall 
in prayer. Oh, Lord, say to him: 'You used to have a little 
money — now you have much, you are independent, now see how 
you are living. When you didn't have it you had family prayers. 
Now you have no God and no family prayer.' 

"Do you want him to send the hearse? There is his wife all 
wrapped up in the cod-fish aristocracy. She don't want you to 
speak. But you can. She may be deaf but you will make her 
hear. Oh, you can, Lord, but I hope that you won't have to. 

"There is the business man practicing trickery and skull-dug- 
gery in business. Does he want you to speak? No, but if you 
do he will hear. Here are women who say that I have not been 
the best that I could have been in my bank or office or store. I 
have not been my best as a school teacher. I have been weak- 
kneed. I have not been my best as a Sunday school teacher; I 
might have been so much more helpful than I have. There are so 
many things that I could have done that I have not touched. So 
many things that I have done that I am ashamed that I did. 
Tonight we want to renew our vow and covenant and say : 'God 
forgive me ; I want to be more useful than ever before.' 

"And while with heads bowed in prayer I want to ask that every 
man or woman whether Catholic or Protestant, to say: 'I have 
not been as good as I might have b^en. I see where I have missed 
it. I want you to put my name in your prayer.' Lift up your 
hands. Put up your hands. Say, T have not lived as I should 
as a Christian. By the grace of God I will renew my vows/ 
With the help of God, will you be more helpful. If you will, stand 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 285 

up and let me see you. I want the inspiration that comes from 
looking into the faces of men and women that will stand up and 
do this. Come on, come on. 

"Our Father in heaven, we have not done this for any show. 
If it is hard for those in the church we can't expect the fellow that 
never made a stand to do it. If it is difficult for us we ought 
to be the first. We ought to be glad of the chance to say, 'Lord, 
I love you and I want you to know it. I want you to put a finger 
on the things in my life that made me useless and I promise that 
I will get rid of it, Lord/ There are a lot of people that are going 
home tonight and will read their Bible and pray which they have 
not done for a long time. They will. ask a blessing at the table 
tomorrow morning — they won't sit and gulp down their food. 
They are going to help the children for God. They are going 
to the store and say to the clerks : T am going to live different.' 
Going to the bank and say : 'Boys, I have been a member of the 
church, but I have never said much about it, and boys, I am going 
to live different ! I am going to be more useful.' Help the law- 
yer to say to the stenographer, T have been dictating letters to you 
for months and you have been kind and obliging, but I have never 
spoken to you of Jesus.' Help us, Lord, that God may get hold 
of lips and tongues. May we speak to men on the streets, the 
merchants and clerks, as we go into the stores, about Jesus. 

"Do great and wonderful things in old Decatur. Save thou- 
sands and thousands and we will never cease to praise Thee. In 
the name of Jesus Christ, whom not having seen, we love." 



Prayer 



"Now, our Father, we thank Thee for love and mercy and for 
the people that came this afternoon. We thank Thee for Thy 
goodness and the privilege of preaching Thy truth. We thank 
Thee, Lord God, for there is nothing greater in the universe than 
the opportunity of leading men and women, and so, Lord, we 
hope everybody realizes the marvelous chance. Help people to 
see how many they can bring to Jesus Christ. 

"Purify our hearts, we pray, Lord, help us to put out of our 



286 Life and Labors of 

lives everything that will impede our progress, cr keep our lives 
closed for Christ or make us inactive for the vineyard of the Lord. 

"Oh, here are thousands that know not Jesus Christ. Oh, God, 
we do pray for the people of the community, and Lord, Thou 
knowest when we cannot sleep, there is heavy upon our minds 
and hearts the unsaved. And may the church come up to the 
help of the Lord against the mighty. Oh, God, we read: 'Curse 
ye, Meroz, curse ye, the inhabitants thereof; because they came 
not up to the help of the Lord ; to the help of the Lord against 
the mighty.' 

' 'O God, may that startle the people to realize what God's curse 
will be upon them, not alone for the things they do but for the 
things they do not do. We pray Thou will rewrite the history of 
Decatur. We pray that there may be born a new Decatur, O 
Lord ; hear us, we pray. Bring thousands upon thousands into 
the kingdom. We are not asking too much for Thee. They are 
here and know not God. Hundreds of men in Mueller's and other 
factories, and the railroad shops and up in the stores and offices, 
and the shops, and the farmers that come in, and the people that 
come on the train. People are anxious all round about. Great 
God, such a spirit of inquiry is marvelous. Our Father, cer- 
tainly, it is time the church of God awakens. May the church 
realize the opportunity it has. Men of the world realize it, our 
God. It is simply a business proposition with them, but we are 
glad that the cause of Jesus Christ is having such an inning in 
our day. All over the land people are anxious to be right with 
God, and what a chance we have. Decatur has a great opportu- 
nity right here, and so help every member of the church, every 
stranger that knows God to do everything they can. 

"Bless the people tonight and bring the people nearer to God, 
and may they go out with a hatred of sin. Our Father, we pray 
that Thou will bless the young people's meetings. We pray that 
the Spirit of God may sweep through and none be left on the side 
of the Devil. Save the youth, the young men and women. We 
have been told how at 2 and 3 o'clock in the morning they come 
around this tabernacle, girls not more than 15 years old, with 
young men, gadding the streets at that hour of the night, out for 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 287 

no good, we know. Oh, hear us and help us, we beseech of Thee, 
that we may not be asleep spiritually, for then we know we will 
be asleep morally. Save the youth, we pray. God startle these 
young people into a realization of their awful peril. Bless us, we 
beseech of Thee. Do great things in these days and we shall 
never cease to praise Thee, in the name of Jesus." 



Prayer 



"Lord, we thank you. God, you do move in a mysterious way 
Thy wonders to perform. Help us, we pray. Thou art going 
to do wonderful things. Save thousands. Already we hear of 
people being converted in the prayer meetings. We hear of 
scarcely a meeting that somebody is not converted ; for these indi- 
cations we thank Thee. We have been privileged to meet the busi- 
ness men, to go into the stores, the offices, the banks, and on the 
streets ; we have been received with kindness. God bless Decatur 
and smile upon it. Bless the people in the surrounding towns. 
Bless the farmers, bless the strangers. Bring them in from near 
and far until they can carry out with them the glad tidings like 
they did in Jerusalem of old when they ran back throughout the 
country and said: 'The Lord has begun/ They got inspiration 
from the Temple and went out singing. Help us and bless us and 
may all the city sing for righteousness. May they hum this tune 
on the street. Sing it in the business college, in the school, in the 
university, in the street car barns, down in the police station. May 
the newsy on the street sing. Hear us, our God, we pray, in the 
phone office, and everywhere. Lord, Jesus, we pray that the sub- 
ject of religion may be primal. Hear us, Lord, we want the 
burnt offering to begin this afternoon, that the song of the Lord 
can begin. Hear us, God, we pray in the name of Jesus." 



288 Life and Labors of 



Is it well with thee? Is it well with thy hus- 
band? Is it well with the child? — II Kings 4 :26. 

"Fifty-three miles north of Jericho, eight miles from Tabor, 
four miles from Shechem once stood the ancient city of Shunam, 
situated in one of the most picturesque and fertile spots on the 
globe. Surrounded by olive orchards and fields of waving grain, 
and with babbling springs and brooks, an ideal place for an ideal 
home. And there in that city was a home presided over by a 
famous woman of the day. 

"Elisha, the prophet, used to pass by that home on his journey 
from Mt. Carmel back to the school of prophets at Jericho. And 
there was something in his conduct and actions which led this 
woman to conclude he was a man of God, for she said to her hus- 
band one day: 'I perceive that this is a holy man of God that 
passeth by us continually.' Women as a rule have keener percep- 
tion when it comes to things religious and moral and I believe if 
womanhood was no better than manhood God would have dumped 
the whole thing into hell long ago in disgust. 

"Many a family name is kept in the forefront for nothing you 
did as a man but because of the life your wife lived. You kept 
the name in the front with things iniquitous and any sneering to 
be done about God you do. You are the one to put the stain 
upon the family name and make it synonymous with everything 
vile. And anything great to be done will be done by the wife 
that bears your name, or the mother that brought you into the 
world. I perceive the old man was probably too busy in politics 
or trying to corner the wheat market, or wondering what May 
oats would be worth. 'I perceive that a man is passing by us 
continually.' She was watching to bring influences to bear that 
would help her home and children. 'I perceive, husband, that 
this is a holy man of God, that passeth by us continually, and 
there is much benefit that will accrue to us if a man like that would 
only stop and rest beneath our roof.' 

"I perceive people every day pass up opportunities. Many a 
man is walking the streets an ignoramus simply because he missed 
his chance. 'I perceive that a man of God is passing by us con- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 289 

tinually.' I perceive that God is giving you a chance through 
this great campaign to make something out of yourself ; but men 
and women are stranded wrecks out upon the highway of life, 
good only for danger signals. 

" 'I perceive that a man of God passeth this way continually/ 
and she said : 'Husband, let us build a little room and put in it a 
bed, and stand, and a candlestick, and a pitcher of water/ Evi- 
dently her suggestion met with the approval of her husband, and 
ever afterwards the man of God used to stop and rest himself on 
his journey from Mt. Carmel to the school or seminary at Jericho. 

"In the home there was one child. When he was grown to be 
quite a boy one day he went out into the field and the hot oriental 
sun beat upon his head. And one day he cried out, 'My head, 
my head/ And his father said: 'Carry the lad home to his 
mother.' And they brought him to the house, and then, to my 
mind, occurs one of the saddest things in the Old Testament. 
He sat upon his mother's knees until noon and then he died. 
Broken hearted, she laid him upon the bed of the man of God. 

"And she turned to her servants and said: 'Saddle me a beast 
and drive on.' Down yonder was the dead child. Here on the 
highway the broken-hearted mother. Yonder on the mountain 
side was the man of God that she believed held the secret. That 
he would pray and God would hear him. And Elisha looked 
down the road and saw her coming, and he said to Gehazi (his 
private secretary) : 'Yonder comes that Shunammite woman. Run 
and see what she wants/ And he ran and met her and he said 
in the words of the text: 'Is it well with thee? Is it well with 
thy husband ? Is it well with thy child ?' She answered after the 
manner of the Eastern salutation: Tt is well.' She came near, 
dropped upon her knees, and threw her arms about the feet of 
the man of God and sobbed. Gehazi thinking that perhaps she 
was insane, seized her by the shoulders, and would have dragged 
her by physical force, when the man of God said: 'Do not use 
her rudely; let her alone, for her soul is vexed within her; and 
the Lord hath not revealed it unto me/ Then he asked why she 
had come and why she wept. And Elisha said to Gehazi : 'You 
take my staff and go lay that on the dead child that he may live/ 

19 



290 Life and Labors of 

"Gehazi seized the staff and started down the road and as he 
left Elisha called after him: 'See thou salute no man, and if any 
salute thee, answer him not again/ 

"It will be necessary for you to understand something of orien- 
tal customs and habits to know what he meant. A man traveling 
through Palestine said that he saw two Orientals meet and they 
saluted each other and then they kissed each other, and then they 
removed their turbans, and their packs, and went through incan- 
tations and salutations and it took them just 32 minutes by the 
watch to go through that rigmarole. And you can understand if 
Gehazi met very many and stopped to go through all that it 
would take him all day to go a mile. And there was the same 
custom when Jesus was on earth — and is today. When Jesus 
sent the seventy disciples out he said: 'Salute no man by the 
way—but hurry on — don't stop ; it does not make any difference 
what anybody thinks of you/ 

1 'And she said to Elisha : 'As the Lord God liveth and my soul 
liveth, I will not let thee go/ and she compelled His presence 
there. I think one of the curses of the church today is that there 
seems to be a perpetual sign out: 'Wanted — a recipe whereby 
our work can be accomplished by proxy/ And you think that 
because you put something into the collection plate, or do some- 
thing once in awhile, that you are free from any further obliga- 
tion. 

"She said: 'Gehazi may be all right to write for you, but I 
want you down there to pray — ' and she compelled him to go. 

"He returned to the home and put everybody out of the house, 
and went into the room where the child lay, and spread himself 
on the dead child, hands on the hands of the child, and his mouth 
on the mouth of the child, and the child's body became warm, 
and the heart started to beat like a huge pump, and the eyelids 
trembled, and the lips moved, and the child asked for his mother. 
Elisha called Gehazi and said: 'Carry the lad to his mother/ 
And the tears were changed to laughter, and the grief to song, 
and sighing to peace. Because her confidence in the man of God 
had not been misplaced. 

"Why do you suppose God gives us that beautiful picture? 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 291 

'Oh, that is an Old Testament incident.' Yes, but there is a story 
in it, and a lesson, that I feel is peculiarly applicable tonight. And 
for that reason, after much thought and prayer, I bring this mes- 
sage, and for the first message God wants to teach us importunity 
in prayer. No matter what the difficulties or the obstacles hell 
may pile in the way, determination on your part is sworn to get 
you to Jesus Christ. No matter if the brewery and the grogshop 
pile everything that is vile before you, you are going to have a 
magnificent time over all that hell can belch and puke forth — 
and you are going to try to bring that boy and girl to their knees. 

"Years ago in Cincinnati, a minister had preached the gospel of 
Jesus Christ with all the culture and the learning that he pos- 
sessed, and at the close of the sermon the Spirit seemed to say 
to him. 'Give the invitation — ask if there is not someone here sick 
and tired of sin/ And he said that he asked the audience to bow 
their heads and he did something that he had not done in the rich 
and fashionable church for nine years: He said: 'If there is 
one tonight sick and tired of sin and wants to turn to God, lift 
the hand/ and as he waited the door opened and a young man 
came and listened. And the minister said: 'Is not there one 
that is tired of sin who will lift your hand?' This young man 
leaped to his feet and lifted his hand and then said: 'Pray for 
me, sir; I am sick and tired of sin;' and dropped into a seat 
sobbing. 

"The minister did pray and then hurried down to the young 
man and learned a sad story of prodigality. He learned that for 
eight years he had been an outcast. The minister said: 'Now 
take my advice, and write home and tell your parents what you 
have done/ 

"He did not expect to hear from Brooklyn for four days but 
on the 4th day there was no answer, and on the 5th nothing, and 
he was anxious and on the 6th day none, and he was worried. 
And on the 7th day no answer, and he was distressed, and on the 
8th day he was in agony. On the 9th day a letter came but it was 
bordered with black — and with tears he broke the seal and read 
something like this — 'My precious boy — the joy that your letter 
brought to the home is only exceeded by the sadness at the same 



292 Life and Labors of 

time. For as nearly as we can figure the same day and hour 
that you found Jesus Christ your Savior in the church in Cin- 
cinnati your father was going out into the skys.' 

" 'All day long he had rolled upon his bed and his mind wand- 
ered to a land that he knew not, and ever and anon he would say : 
"Save my boy; God save my poor, wandering, wayward boy to- 
night. Oh, God, hear the dying cry of a father; save my poor 
wayward, wandering, drunken boy tonight." 

" 'And,' said the mother, 'he would try to turn his mind from 
you and your wanderings, but it would roam and he would cry 
out, and just before he passed into the sky he cried: "O, God, 

save my " and he finished the prayer in the presence of Jesus.' 

And the mother added in an after note : 'You are a Christian to- 
night because your poor old father would not let God go.' 

"Oh, for men and women in Decatur, Illinois, that could pray 
like that. Oh, that men would forget to eat, forget to sleep, that 
they would forget the store, forget the bank, forget your literary, 
your society pink teas, forget neighborhood gossip, forget every- 
thing but that men are going to damnation, and that you work to 
bring them to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. 

"Is it well with thee? I want to make the application of my 
message tonight so personal that not a man, woman or child can 
leave and say honestly, 'It did not apply to me; it did not mean 
me.' Is it well with thee ? It is a matter of personal salvation and 
I will answer. How can it be well ? How can it be well with man 
or woman when if the judgment of God would fall on you, you 
would be in hell before the clock would strike twelve ? How can 
it be well when God is your enemy? You have fought against 
God until some sit here gray-haired, dim of eye and step short- 
ened as you near the hearse — or if God should shape a shroud 
over you? 

"Is it well with thee? There are friends here tonight that are 
anxious for your salvation. There are hundreds and thousands 
of people in this audience that would like to see you converted 
and brought to Jesus Christ. Your wife would love it. 

"When I was in New York a friend of mine told me that a 
man came to him and said : 'Do you want to shake the hand of 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 2g$ 

a redeemed drunkard?' My friend said it would give him pleas- 
ure and delight to shake the hand of anyone who had been re- 
deemed. He said : 'I used to be one of the most prosperous mer- 
chants in this town. I used to own three of the largest buildings 
in this town. I started drinking, and gambling, and betting on 
the horse races, and kindred other evils, and gradually I saw my 
business slipping away. I put a mortgage on that building and 
it was foreclosed to keep the others going. Then I put a mort- 
gage on that one, then on this one, until at last they were all gone. 
I was lying one day so drunk in the hall in the building that I 
used to have my office in, that I could not stand, when a man 
came and shook me and said: "Jim, hurry home, quick, if you 
want to see your boy alive." 

" T jumped up ; it sobered me in a minute. I rushed to the bed- 
side of my boy and he said : "Papa, promise," as he slipped his thin 
transparent arms about my neck ; "promise me you will quit drink- 
ing and be kind to mamma." 

" 'I slipped to my knees and with his arms about my neck and 
his hot breath about my cheeks, I promised I would. He said: 
"If you will promise me that, I^will see you in heaven/' 

" 'I have tried to keep that promise. That old habit and that 
old appetite has come back and sometimes I can hardly get past 
the saloon and sometimes I cross the street so I won't smell the 
fumes as they belch out through the door. Sometimes that old 
habit and that old appetite comes back and I think that I must 
go in and take just one drink. But if I did all would be off with 
me and I would not disappoint that boy for the world. I know 
there is one up yonder anxious for my salvation, and by the grace 
of God, when I go I want to meet him. I thought you wouldn't 
mind taking my hand and giving me a little encouragement.' 

"There are friends here who are anxious for your salvation. 
Is it well with thee ? A friend of mine in New York City whose 
work was to meet the immigrants and counsel and guide and in- 
struct the young men as they landed in this country. A ship load 
came in from Scotland one day and my friend noticed a bright 
looking young man, a Scotchman, whom he walked up to and 
said: 'Can I be of help to you? Direct you to a Christian home 



294 Life and Labors of 

or boarding house or church home? I represent the Y. M. C. A. 
and it is my duty to help all the foreigners.' 'No,' said the Scot ; 
'I don't need any help.' My friend then put the inevitable ques- 
tion to him: 'Are you a Christian?' 'No,' said the haughty, arro- 
gant young Scotchman. My friend said to him: 'Have you a 
father and a mother?' 'Yes, sir, both of them are alive.' 'Are 
they Christians?' 'Yes, sir; both professing Christians.' 'Have 
you got any brothers and sisters?' 'Yes, sir.' 'Are they Chris- 
tions?' 'Yes, sir.' 'You are not?' 'No, sir; I have got along 
thus far without Jesus Christ, and I think I can make it the rest 
of the way.' My friend said: 'I have seen stronger men than 
you wrecked.' The haughty young Scotchman said : 'I could take 
you by the neck and cast you into the sea.' He repeated to him 
again, 'I have seen stronger men than you wrecked without Jesus 
Christ. Don't you think, young man, that you can make a touch- 
down without Jesus Christ. I have seen great men stricken and 
wrecked and fallen by the wayside.' My friend left the Scotch- 
man with three verses from the scripture. 

"Two years later my friend took a position in the Y. M. C. A. 
at Chicago, and among his duties were to visit the hospitals. One 
day a telephone message came asking him to come down to the 
hospital to talk to a young man who was dying. My friend put 
on his coat and hat, jumped on the street car and hurried over 
to the hospital. He met the warden in the office and when he 
made his errand known to him he said : 'No, you can't see the 
young man for three reasons. First, you are not an ordained 
minister, second it is past the visiting hours of from two to four, 
and third that young man has a bad disease. No, you can't see 
him.' 

"My friend talked with the warden and finally he said : 'Well, 
in your case I will make a special concession to you, and you can 
see him and pray for him, but you can't touch him.' 'My friend 
went to the bedside of the young man and what he said I have 
not the language to describe, and second, I haven't any disposi- 
tion to do so, if I had. He looked upon the man who was a mass 
of putrefaction. One of his eyes had sloughed out and his fingers 
had separated, the flesh dropping off, and his hair falling out. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 295 

My friend gazed at him and staggered back as he recognized the 
haughty young Scotchman whom two years ago he had met as he 
landed in this country. He said: 'O God, isn't it awful? I 
would give the city if I could only be back where I stood two 
years ago when I first touched American soil and listened to you. 
I wish you would go out and tell the young men of Chicago that 
they can't live or win the battle without Jesus Christ, and if they 
think they know better, tell them about me.' 

"I tell you, sir, you can't win without Jesus Christ. You can 
climb dazzling heights, you can sit down on a throne and sway a 
scepter of power over the whole world, you can walk down this 
aisle with a certificate of graduation from every college and uni- 
versity on God's earth and have a post graduate course, but I tell 
you without Jesus Christ you are a flat failure. What benefit 
can a man get out of the world and lose his own soul? Is it well 
with you ? No, no, no-0-0. Not if he sits there or stands there 
without Jesus Christ as his savior. I would rather have standing 
room in heaven than the whole world. Is it well with you? Is 
is well with your husband, that man sitting by your side, that man 
whose name you bear, that man who is the father of your chil- 
dren? That man for the love of whom you kissed your father 
good-bye and left a good deal better home than the one you have 
got now ? That man for the love of whom you have suffered and 
have been cursed and damned and beaten many a time as though 
you were a brute instead of a human being? That man by the 
sweat of whose brow and the use of whose brain and muscle has 
been earned the money that bought the clothes that cover your 
body and pay for house rent? That man whose footsteps you 
dread to hear come home, or whose footsteps you delight to hear ? 
Is it well with your husband ? Is it well with your husband ? 

"I believe why a lot of you women beat a path back and forth 
from your home to church alone is that so long as your husband 
provides for you comfortably and is reasonably generous and 
buys a new dress every time the style or fad changes, or a new 
bonnet, you don't care. You don't care. Do you realize that if 
that man should drop dead you would never see him again, and 
he would go to hell although your name is on the church record ? 



296 Life and Labors of 

You never put forth an effort to try to win him to Jesus Christ. 
Is it well with your husband ? Is it well with your husband ? 

"I think it would be a God-send to some homes if a step-mother 
could come into some homes if she only had religion. Is it well 
with your husband? 'Has your master gone to heaven?' asked 
a man of an old negro one time. 'No sir,' said the negro. 'Why 
not?' 'I have been with my massa 32 years and he always told 
me befo he started what he wanted me to get ready and what he 
wanted to take. I have been with him 32 years and I never heard 
him talk about heaven, never heard him mention the name of 
heaven, so he never went to heaven 'cause he never got ready.' 

"There are men and women prominent in lodges, politics and 
society, men who stand well in law and medicine, men who in 
this town are respected by everybody, but if you should die to- 
night and your obituary notice should appear in the newspaper 
tomorrow, the whole community might guess where you went. 
No thought of God or prayer or heaven. God pity the man who 
lives with no thought of God. 

"Is it well with your husband? I have a friend who is a 
preacher in an eastern city. He was preaching one night in the 
church and asking people to give their hearts to Christ. One 
woman who was sitting on the front seat, cried out: Tray for 
my husband who is sitting by my side.' I believe God gave her 
light to pray for him for it was his last chance. She sat down 
weeping and some women came and said to my friend: 'Aren't 
you going to rebuke her?' He replied, 'How do I know but that 
God told her to do it ?' 

"The next evening before my friend went into the pulpit the 
same women came to him w r ith tears rolling down their cheeks 
and said: 'Forgive us. And pray that God will too. We heard 
this afternoon about 5 o'clock that that man sent a 32-calibre bul- 
let crashing through his brain.' 

"I believe God gave the wife light to see that her husband was 
listening to his funeral sermon and that it was heaven or hell. 
I believe these meetings in Decatur is the bell of God tolling out 
the testimony of thousands of souls. These meetings will deter- 
mine whether multitudes of you men are going to heaven or hell. 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 297 

Then be as men in the name of Jesus Christ. Is it well with 
thee? 

'Is it getting night?' asked an old Scotch lady 92 years old, 
'is it getting night?' said she to her husband? 'Yes, Janet,' said 
her husband, two years her senior. 'It is getting night?' She 
looked up and said to her husband: 'Are the boys all in?' 'Yes. 
Janet/ he said, 'the boys are all in.' The last one had gone to 
heaven 24 years before. 'Husband,' she said, 'I will soon be 
there, won't I?' 'Yes, Janet,' he said, as a tear rolled down his 
weather-beaten face. 'It won't be long.' 'You will be there 
soon, too/ she said. 'Yes, Janet/ and she closed her eyes, and he 
thought she was gone. But she came back as if from the skies, 
and said to her husband : 'You will soon come, won't you ?' 'Yes/ 
said he; 'by the grace of Jesus Christ, Janet, it won't be long/ 
She slipped her white arms about his neck, kissed him, and her 
face lighted up like a halo of glory in a smile, and she shut her 
eyes and was gone forever. Yes, but that isn't true of a good 
many homes in this town. Is it well with thee? Is it well with 
your husband? Not if he sits at home or here without Jesus 
Christ. 

"Is it well with your children? Listen to me. I have often 
tried to imagine this scene, but every attempt has been a com- 
plete failure. I have tried to imagine Noah and his wife sitting 
in the Ark, Noah looking up and saying : 'Huh, 10 o'clock ; where 
are the boys, mother?' 'They are out; they are over at so-and- 
so's at a card party; they took the night keys with them and 
they will be back later on/ 

"I have tried to imagine them sitting in the ark contented and 
satisfied. I could no more imagine it than I could imagine you 
sitting in your home not knowing where your boy or girl is. I 
can't imagine it. Is it well with your children? Is it well with 
your children? You are interested in their education and you 
hire the best teachers money will buy. If you have no children 
of your own you are paying taxes to educate other men's chil- 
dren. That is right, too. Is it well with your children? You 
are interested in their education and you are interested in their 
health. You will work hard to buy them clothes and food, and if 






298 Life and Labors of 

they are sick you will send for a physician. You are concerned 
for his education and you are concerned for his health, but my 
God, if your children ever walk the streets of heaven it will be 
because some stranger took more interest in their salvation than 
you. If he finds God and hears him say, 'Well done/ it will be 
because some stranger took more interest in him than his father 
and mother. God pity a young person who is compelled to call 
a man father and a woman mother who is like that. 

"If I had a child five years of age I would first get right with 
God myself, then I would teach him Jesus Christ. Some of you 
people who are looking into my face tonight and some of you 
people who are on this platform have got to walk down here and 
accept Jesus Christ or you will never save this whisky-soaked 
town. Then your children will be brought to Jesus Christ and 
other people will be brought to Jesus Christ. You spend too 
much time in society and Sunday golf, pink teas and literaries, 
and a lot of other things, that don't amount to the snap of my 
finger. Is it well with your children? Is it well with your chil- 
dren? Then what? I tell you I would live before them. 

"A man here the other night spoke to a young man and said : 
'Are you a Christian?' He replied, 'I am not.' 'How old are 
you? 'Twenty-six.' A young man with the best part of his 
life before him. Very well, don't give the best part of your life 
to the Devil. I have no patience or sympathy for a man who 
will give the best part of his life to the Devil and ask God to take 
what is left. 'Well, is your father a Christian?' he was asked. 
'No.' 'Is your mother?' 'Yes,' he said. 'Then isn't your 
mother's religion good enough for you? Haven't you confidence 
enough in her for that ?' 'No, to be honest, I haven't/ 

"God pity you, who are here tonight, you mothers, who have 
boys who will testify that they haven't enough confidence in your 
religion to follow it. You will be damned when you stand before 
God. More because your name is on the church record. You 
take a Methodist, or a Presbyterian, or a Baptist, and they have 
a little Presbyterianism, and a little Methodism, and a little card 
and a little theater and a little dance and wine drinking and Sun- 
day golf playing, and you will get what you see so many times in 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 299 

the world. Religious humbug is the humbuggiest humbug on 
earth. I despise it. 

"Is it well with the children ? I was preaching and I asked my 
friend Chapman, who is pastor of the Fifth Avenue church, to 
make a talk one night. He had been talking about 15 minutes 
when up the aisle came a man and handed him a note. He read 
the note which read something like this: 'Hurry, come quick; 
your son is over here at a certain inn drunk !' 

"He asked the audience to excuse him while he went away. 
They did and he agreed to come back. He hurried over to the 
inn and went down a rickety stair to the bar room, where 
he saw his son lying over a greasy card table in a drunken stupor. 
He touched him and aroused him until the boy looked up and 
recognized his father. And he partly carried and partly dragged 
him to the hotel and put him to bed. He sat and talked and 
prayed and asked him to give his heart to God. He said he 
would. He asked him to sign a pledge and he said he would. 
He sat and watched until he fell asleep. 

"He hurried back to the church and it was 10 o'clock. The 
audience was sitting there waiting. He started to talk again and 
had talked about 5 minutes when he broke down and asked the 
audience to excuse him, and he went back to the hotel. He lay 
until nearly 4 o'clock before he went to sleep. About 8 o'clock 
there came a knock and a rap at the door and they said : 'Get up ; 
we fear that all is not right with your son.' He got up and hur- 
riedly dressed and went over to his son's room. They broke the 
door open and there lying in the bed in a pool of blood with a 
revolver in his right hand and two chambers empty, and two holes 
in the boy's temple, told the sad story. 

"A note was lying on the table. It read like this: 'Dear 
Father: After you left me last night the old habit came back, 
and I fought and fought the fatal appetite. I made up my mind 
that it would be best to end it now while I was in disgrace. 
Father, if you had been a different man I would not be here and 
this would not have happened.' 

"There are men in this audience, men in Decatur that are lead- 
ing the young men of this town straight to hell and damnation. 



300 Life and Labors of 

God pity you when the boy points his finger in your face and 
holds you up as an example. Is it well with your children ? 

"I tell you the trouble is you wait too long. You wait too long. 
You wait until that boy staggers into your presence drunk be- 
fore you teach him. You wait until he curses God in your face 
before you teach him ' Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord 
thy God in vain.' You wait until he makes the family name stink 
before you teach him 'Honor thy father and thy mother.' 

"You wait until he has robbed some young girl of her virtue 
and the mute evidence of their affection can no longer be hid 
before you teach him 'thou shalt not commit adultery.' You wait 
too long, sir. It is too late to repair a ship after they have backed 
out of dry dock. It is too late to take swimming lessons after the 
vessel has begun to sink. It is too late to send for the insurance 
agent after the flames are shooting through the windows. It is 
too late to travel to a life insurance agent after the doctor has 
shaken his head. You wait too long. You wait too long with 
your prayer, you wait too long with your tabernacle, you wait too 
long with the sermon, and the song; it is too late, it is too late, 
too late. Hell is dragging them off. Too late." 



Rev. Wm. A, (Billy) Sunday 301 



"He that winneth souls is wise.* 



"You can't learn by birth or by attending schools, by passing 
resolutions. The church is a past master on going to conventions 
and passing resolutions, but if the world is ever going to be saved 
you will have to do something more than that. "He that winneth 
souls is wise." You are doing what God wants you to do when 
you are winning souls, and the Devil don't want you to do it. 
You need wisdom and there is nothing in the world where you 
need more good horse sense than in trying to do something for 
Jesus Christ. 

"It is said that travelers in the far East in the desert countries, 
when the party gets out of water, separate and go as far from 
each other as they can be heard calling, and the one who finds 
water turns and calls to the one next to him and the word is 
passed along until the entire company has quenched its thirst. 
A man is dying and another has found something that will save 
him; what shall we think of him if he keeps it all to himself? 

"At the meeting last night there were twenty-five people on 
one seat, one-half of them college professors, and all but two of 
them professing Christians, and yet most of these professing 
Christians were showing no concern for the two on the seat that 
were not Christians.. There are so many godless church members 
that are glued to the seat and are mere bench warmers. 

"If you think I am going to stay here in Decatur and rip my 
voice when a lot of godless church members won't work you are 
mightily fooled. I have heard of a lot of church members who 
have gone home and burned your cards but if you are going to 
work you will have to let people know what you did. You can't 
sneak in under cover. You did the other thing in the open and 
they know you did it and now you have got to come out in the 
open and confess. 

"I tell you the church is in a worse condition than you think 
it is. We put the bright side out at conferences and conventions 
but the church is in bad shape and that's the reason Christian 
Science and all the folderol tommyrot has grown up so. The 
people are looking for something and the church is so backslidden 



302 Life and Labors of 

they can't give them anything. And the variety fads have crept 
in and a lot of preachers have chased after these things. 

"A lot of ministers are a lot more interested in society than they 
are in personal work. Men are afraid to talk religion. The 
banker, merchant, school teacher ought to talk religion, but you 
have got to go some to find one of them. We have the whole 
thing wrong ; instead of preaching two weeks in a year to sinners 
and fifty to church members we ought to turn it about and preach 
fifty weeks to the sinner and two weeks to the church members. 

"No wonder the church has every spiritual disease from appen- 
dicitis to the gout. The church is like the feeding of the python 
in the show, when he gets so he won't eat they hang a jack rab- 
bit to a fifteen-foot fish-pole and ram it down its throat and so 
the church has been fed on sermons and music until it has spiritual 
dyspepsia. You get up and read a paper in some jack rabbit 
literary society, but when it comes to talking Jesus Christ your 
lips are sealed like a bank vault. 

"Some think the church is to educate people and it poses as a 
third rate amusement bureau, and it runs a minstrel show on 
occasions and gives more time to getting up a cantata than it 
does to saving people. You can have a Carnegie library on every 
corner and a high school eater-cornered across the street, and yet 
a tidal wave of hell and damnation may be sweeping over the 
country. 

"Diplomas don't take people to heaven. You can't take any- 
thing but souls to heaven; you can't take your deeds and mort- 
gages. God don't ask whether you liked me or not or whether my 
eccentricities or idiosyncracies or whether my roughness grated 
on your ears. He will say, 'Bill, did you preach my doctrine ; did 
you work as hard as you know how ?' And I will say, 'Yes/ and 
He will say, 'Come and sit on my right.' 

"God will say : 'Did you sit around here and warm the benches 
while my servant split his throat to preach the gospel ?' And He 
will say: 'Step over on the left; your elevator will be going down 
in a few minutes.' 

"The only thing that pleases Jesus is winning souls. The bells 
of heaven do not ring when you get a hundred per cent dividend 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 303 

but they do ring when one soul comes into the kingdom. Wesley 
said that if he had thirty men that hated nothing but sin he would 
storm the citadels of hell. 

" 'He that winneth souls is wise.' If there is anything I love 
to see in a church it is enthusiasm, and if there is anything I hate 
in the English language it is the word conservative. When I go 
into a town they tell me a certain minister, in a certain church, is 
conservative and they don't believe in revivals; that means they 
have taken the Devil's opiate and gone to sleep and I begin at 
once to lay my dynamite mines and get busy. If my wife was in 
a burning building I would want her carried out if she didn't 
have any clothes on. And it wouldnt make any difference whether 
she came out head first or feet first, just so they got her out. 

"Some of you old ossified, petrified, dried up, mildewed church 
members are afraid something will be done out of the ordinary. 
If I was a pastor of a church, I would get a brass band every 
Sunday night and I would give hell the best run for its money 
that I could. Quit chewing the rag. Quit your criticism, get 
your adjustments before the meeting closes and get down to try 
and help somebody. You let the 6,000 church members in this 
town stand out as one man and we will drive out the beer saloons 
and gambling dens and the cussed leg shows and the holes in the 
wall and the rest of the hell holes that have corrupted the town 
for seventy-five years. We will make a new Decatur. 

" 'He that winneth souls is wise.' You will need perseverance 
to do it for God and for God's truth. Ole Bull said that when 
he practiced one day he noticed it. Two days and his friends 
noticed it. Three days and the public applauded. So we need 
perseverance and well chosen words. There is a leading man 
in this city who is not a Christian, and an old backslidden hypo- 
critical humbug went up to see him at his office and said: 'I am 
praying for you/ 

" 'Great God ; if God has to wait for men like that to lead me 
to Jesus there are a lot of us fellows who will stay out.' And a 
woman, an old hatchet-faced, gimlet-eyed, cadaverous gossiper 
called him up on the phone, and said: 'I am praying that you 
will get right with God.' He said, 'Get out;' and hung up the 



304 Life and Labors of 

receiver. The idea of your trying to do anything with that man. 

" 'He that winneth souls is wise/ You need to read your Bibles. 
I asked a woman once how she read her Bible and she said I 
just shut my eyes, make a silent prayer and open it and go to 
reading it. Suppose now she should open to the Chronicles of 
the Kings where it says: Teleg begat Jehu and Jehu begat — ' 
that is no good. She needed to read in James where it says, 'hold 
your tongue/ or in Matthew where it says, 'pay your debts/ You 
want to get over there. 

"The trouble with the church is that it is not working. The 
preacher is worked to death. He has to preach two sermons a 
week, run a prayer meeting and do a-hundred-and-one things 
while the church of God sits around playing cards, drinking beer, 
going to leg shows, and playing golf on Sunday and when it 
comes to choose between the prayer meeting and the card party 
more than half the church members will be found at the card 
party. You ought to be sleeping in the calaboose with the rest 
of the gamblers for you are no better. 

"You say: 'Our church is not against these things/ You lie. 
You might find some individual church with a backslidden 
preacher that is not against these things. If I was in a church 
like that I would not stop to get my rubbers, I would get out so 
fast. 

" 'He that winneth souls is wise/ There is another class. The 
spongers. They come and drink in the sermon, the solo, and the 
duet and the chorus, and they are church members, and the 
moment I begin to ask people to come to God some old woman 
puts on her hat and begins to tear around with her fuss and 
feathers and gets ready to hike out and stop the aisle so any who 
want to come to the front would have to crawl over your old 
carcass; and then you wonder why people are not saved. You 
better stay at home and let somebody have that seat that will do 
something, and you are the kind that always gets the best seat 
in the house. How many fool excuses you can use for not going 
out and doing what the Lord wants you to do. 

"Hit the Devil, don't argue with him. The Devil has been 
doing business for 6,000 years and he never got the gout, ap- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 305 

pendicitis, or rheumatism. He can give you clubs and spades 
and beat you hands down the first crack out of the box. 

"You remember the old farmer that went into the zoological 
garden in New York City. He came to the glass cage full of 
big snakes and he smashed it with his cane and began to do up 
the snakes. And the attendant ran up to him and asked him what 
he was about. And he said: 'I always go after them when I find 
them out in the pasture or anywhere.' That is the way to do 
with the Devil. Hit him in the solar plexus. I'll tell you that 
a chance like this doesn't come but once in 50 years to win souls 
to Christ. 'He that winneth souls is wise,' " 



"Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If 
any man hear my voice and open the door, I will 
come in to him and sup with him and he with 
me." 

"This is a part of the message through the Apostle John written 
while on the island of Patmos to the backslidden church. 

"The church enjoyed many privileges that are not ours today. 
Many had seen Jesus face to face, and heard the gracious pre- 
cepts from His lips, and had been privileged to sit at His feet, 
and had had the inspiration of coming in contact with His mar- 
velous personality. And notwithstanding all this the church was 
in a comatose state, and occasioned the rebuke God gave through 
the Apostle John when on the Island of Patmos, before Nero mur- 
dered him. 

"I feel many things that are inspiring. This great audience 
hurls into the teeth of the carping critic and the old skeptic that 
religion has not lost its power. What under God's heavens brings 
the people here? You would not walk fifty feet to come in and 
hear the greatest infidel this side of hell rail against the church 
and the Bible, and Christ — it is simply because the human heart 
reaches out after God. And the human heart is never satisfied 
short of the presence of God. 

"And it is mere argument — there was never a race of people 
that didn't worship some supreme being. There has never been 
found, even among the aborigines of the South Sea Islands, a 
20 



306 ■ Life and Labors of 

race of people that didn't look up to and worship and love some 
idea or conception of a supreme being; and therefore, with your 
privileges, if you refuse Jesus and His opportunity to return from 
sin, God help you. 

''You listen to me — a great wave of religion that swept out in 
the seventeenth century under Wesley and Whitefield has not lost 
its power, although it has had tremendous odds to go against, but 
it is triumphing magnificently. 

"And yet there is something that is lacking. We are increased 
in goods, yet there are the same poor and naked and blind, and I 
believe this, that Jesus Christ stands at the door of the church life, 
and I believe there is no music, no ritual, no progress in material 
matters, that have a feathers weight of worth with Jesus. 

"You admit the philosophy, you admit education and ethics, 
things that will curse and damn you — you admit the things that 
will benefit you, but will never save your soul. Your culture is a 
blessing — education as well. I won't rebuke you, but you compel 
Jesus, the one force that keeps you from hell to stand without, and 
if He comes in, out would go jealousies and strifes, slandering, 
backbiting and malice — all those things would go out if Jesus 
came in. Let Jesus come in, and out would go the things that 
damn, and blight, and curse the world today. And my text ap- 
plies not only to the church but to every individual that has shut 
Jesus out of his or her life. 

"There he stands a pleading Savior ; and there you are a care- 
less inhabitant, bolting the door of your will, and refusing Him 
permission to enter. Religion lies in the will — not in tears, nor in 
sniffling of the nose. Religion is in your will. If your life is not 
in harmony with the law of God you're not religious. You are 
here tonight because you willed that you would come. Will is 
sovereign-supreme. The throne room of the soul. You do be- 
cause you will to do. You don't do it because you will that you 
will not do. The Christian says : T will do God's will/ and the 
sinner says, T won't do God's will.' 

"I stood one day and looked at a merry-go-round and watched 
the crowd come up, and choose the animals, or various convey- 
ances in which they would ride. Up came a girl wearing a Gains- 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 307 

borough hat, high-heeled lavender shoes, and stockings, and fliffy- 
fluffy dress, and a ribbon around her waist, and she was chewing 
gum. She sat down on the back of a swan. And then up came 
an old man with bird-tail whiskers and he climbed into a chariot. 
And then came a young dude. He had no vest and wore a brown 
belt and white trousers, turned up at the bottom, and tan shoes, 
and a Panama hat, and had a cigarette in his mouth. And he 
threw his leg across a lion. 

"And up came a little, timid girl, about nine years old, and 
looked around, and climbed on a deer. I watched the old and 
the young, and the rich and the poor come up and choose, and the 
signal was given and away they went all going in the same 
direction and all pivoted on the same centre and driven by the 
same machinery. 

"A sinner has no standing with God. God looks upon the 
sinner as though he did not live. He has no spiritual life. Every 
man and woman in this Tabernacle — listen ! They have body and 
soul, whether saved or not. But a Christian has body, soul and 
eternal life. And a sinner has no eternal life. If you have not 
accepted Jesus Christ you have no eternal life. You have a body 
and a soul damned in hell. But you have no spiritual existence. 
If you have not accepted Jesus, you exist like a brute in the field. 
The Christian has body, soul and eternal life, and eternal life is 
free. You can't get it by reformation — not by saying: 'Wife, I 
will drink no more.' You can't get it by saying: 'I will be a 
pure man.' That don't give eternal life. You have got to repent, 
and accept of Jesus Christ. A sinner has no spiritual life. He is 
not a child of God, so therefore a sinner is a rebel against God. 
A sinner is in an attitude towards God like the Confederate States 
were against the Government and Flag, and until they surrendered 
they lost their citizenship, and right of representation. But when 
they surrendered, all came back. 

"God will have no dealings with you unless you are willing to 
repent, and accept Jesus Christ. God will have no dealings with 
you. I don't appeal to your handkerchiefs. You don't need to 
bring your handkerchief here very much to wipe your eyes. I 
will try to appeal to your reason; and the biggest fool is the 



308 Life and Labors of 

man that keeps God out of his heart and life. Religion is the 
most reasonable thing in the world. And you must be a moral 
idiot if you don't see a man is a fool when he is not righteous. A 
man that curses is unreasonable. The man that steals is un- 
reasonable. The prostitute is unreasonable. You are unreason- 
able when you are a sinner, and only reasonable when a Chris- 
tian. 

"Now some fellow says : 'Look here, Mr. Sunday, it is hard to 
get acquainted with God/ No, it is not. It is the easiest thing 
in the world. If you are here and not a Christian, it is because 
you do not want to be. You could be a Christian if you wanted 
to be. When a man says : 'How may I know that God wants to 
come in my heart ?' 

"I believe in the Yankee answer; by asking a question: Tf 
you knew that God did want to come would you let Him come 
in? If you knew that God wanted to help you to be honest, 
would you let Him come in ? If you knew God would make you 
kind to wife and children, would you let God come in?' 

"And that longing for something you have not, which brings 
you here night after night, all that you have felt and seen, and 
heard, and longed for, and all you have imagined and hoped, is 
God saying: 'Let me come into your heart — into your life/ 
We speak of Jesus as the way, the truth, and the life. We speak 
of the personal Christ as the power to save. 

"They dug up a mummy in Egypt not long ago, and around the 
mummy they found some kernels of wheat. And they deciphered 
the wedge shaped inscriptions about the mummy, and found that 
for 3,500 years it had been lying in the tomb. They took these 
kernels of wheat, a couple of handfuls, down to the fertile valley 
of the Nile and sowed it. And it was fecundated by the sun and 
.rich soil. They germinated and grew, and in a few years they 
had harvested 3,700 bushels of wheat from that found about the 
mummy embalmed for thirty-five-hundred years. They still con- 
tained the germ of life and were able to reproduce themselves. 
The words that I am using for my text were spoken eighteen- 
hundred years ago, but still have the power to make drunkards 
sober, and to transform men and homes and wives. That's proof 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 309 

there of Christ and His desire. Religion is not a dogma. It is 
not doctrine. It centers in a personal Christ. 

"You can preach Buddhism without Old Buddha, and Mo- 
hammedanism without Old Mohammed, and Confucianism with- 
out Old Confucius, and you will find a line of teaching mapped 
out — no matter what kind of a man Confucius or Zoroaster, or 
Mohammed might have been. You will find a line of conduct 
mapped out to follow. But you cannot preach Christianity with- 
out Jesus Christ. Jesus is the center and the circumference of 
all. And without the life of Jesus, you have no perfect teacher, 
without His death you have no atonement of sin, and without 
the Resurrection we will have staked our salvation on a dead 
Jew, sleeping in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. Therefore 
in Christ you have 'My way,' and 'My truth/ and 'My life.' 

"And God says: 'If you will let Him come in He will change 
the font of your life from bitter to sweet — where you are now 
drunk, you will be sober ; where you now steal, you will be hon- 
est; where you lie, you will tell the truth. The adulterer will 
be pure; where there is now trickery and skullduggery in your 
business you will be honest and decent.' And now, when a man 
keeps out of his life the influence that will do that, don't walk 
up and expect me to think that you are a man. And all that is de- 
cent that you admire in yourself, and other people, and that makes 
your life and the virtue of your wife and daughter safe on the 
street, is due to the religion of Jesus Christ. 'For some old skep- 
tic to rail at?' Then why in the devil don't you move out and 
go to some town where they don't believe in Jesus Christ? Be- 
cause you know your miserable old head is safe if you hang 
around in the shadow of a church. 

"It is religion that does all this. The true service that God 
wants, in Christ's name, is the service of humanity. 'But/ says 
a man, 'I serve in the church.' So does the Devil. 'I give money 
to the church.' So does the Devil. There is never a service held 
but that he is there. Every oyster supper and reception, and 
prayer meeting he attends. You go to church and give. What 
do you more than others? You might be like the farmer who 
had a hired hand. He was at the table eating. And the farmer 



310 Life and Labors of 

came in and said: 'Are you through? I want you to go out to 
work/ 

"And the man replies: 'Don't I do as much as any man? I 
eat what you set before me, and praise your wife's cooking, and 
get up when you call me; what more do you expect of me? I 
eat the grub, and sleep in the bed that you provide, and praise 
your wife's cooking.' 

"The farmer says, 'I didn't hire you simply to sit at my table 
and eat, I told you that I would pay you so much a month and 
furnish food, a bed to sleep in, and I expected you to get out in 
the field and pay me back in muscle and sweat, for the money and 
the food that I give you, and the bed that I allowed you to sleep 
in.' So we understand that in a business way. And the church 
for 150 years has been trying to learn the same lesson in religion. 

"You have been in Chicago, and know where the Lake Shore 
depot is. At Van Buren street, there stands two trains, so close 
together that you could touch a passenger in one train, while you 
were sitting in the other. A man says: 'You are on the wrong 
train, come and get on this one.' 

" 'No,' says the other man ; 'they are both going in the same 
direction. I don't see the need of it. This train is going the same 
way that that one is.' 

"Those trains run on parallel tracks for six miles until they 
reach Englewood, then the Lake Shore train swings to the left 
and hurries across the hills of Indiana. It skips along the shore 
of Lake Erie and rushes in at the Union Depot at Buffalo. It 
goes down the Mohawk valley in New York and swings down 
the Hudson River along the eastern bank and stops at the Forty- 
second street depot in New York. 

"The other, the Rock Island train, swings off to the right and 
rushes down the corn belt of Illinois and across the Mississippi at 
Rock Island and hurries out across the garden spots of Iowa 
and across the Missouri River at Omaha; it dips down into Ne- 
braska and touches the corner of Kansas. It rushes up to Colo- 
rado Springs and hurries down the Royal Gorge, then over the 
Continental divide, dips down the Western slope and stops at 
San Francisco at the Pacific coast, where the setting sun looks 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 311 

like a huge ball of fire dropping to sleep after illuminating the 
old world. Three thousand miles apart. 

"Two lives start out from home from beneath the same roof, 
start out from the same public schools. They run parallel until 
they reach the point where the roads deflect. They run parallel 
until they reach a point where you know right from wrong ; there 
the roads deflect. And listen, God placed right there where the 
roads deflect a mountain, and called it Mount Calvary. And man 
rushed over that mountain. Then on that mount he placed a 
cross, as Joseph Parker said the cross of Jesus Christ is a stum- 
bling block over which we have the eternal life. On that cross God 
hung Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, and over the body of 
Christ men have rushed for nineteen hundred years and trampled 
God's love beneath their feet. 

"Let me ask you, what more do you think God could have 
done? Listen, if people have treated you like you have treated 
God, do you think you would forgive them? God will do that 
for you. You men have been sitting here listening to me preach 
and looking at me for three weeks, now look at yourself tonight. 
Take a good look at yourself and I will be a beauty. Just look 
at yourself. 

"What did God do ? God said to the disciples — Jesus said : 'Go 
back to Jerusalem. Tarry in Jerusalem.' Moody pictures in the 
following language what he imagines took place between Peter 
and Jesus Christ. Jesus said to Peter : T want you to go back 
to Jerusalem. Go back to the whitened sepulchers. Go back to 
the Pharisees. Go back to the hypocrites and tell them heaven 
instead of hell awaits them if they will repent. Peter, hunt hard 
and look for the man that put the crown of thorns upon my head 
and spat in my face, and scorned me, and tell him I will give him 
the crown of life if he will turn from sin. Peter, I wish you 
would hunt the man up that drove the nails into my hands and 
feet and stuck the spear into my side and tell him there is a 
shorter way to get into my heart than with a spear/ 

"Years ago in Jacksonville, Fla., Judge Owens had a quarrel 
with his fiancee and to forget his love for her he went out into 
the hospital to work among the yellow fever patients. He worked 



312 Life and Labors of 

and toiled incessantly and at last worn out with long and ceaseless 
vigil Judge Owens succumbed to the malady. Although he passed 
the critical stage of the disease he did not mend. One day the 
physician in charge of the hospital was in the city and he met 
this young lady. Said the doctor to her: 'Your friend, Judge 
Owens, is very ill.' Said she : 'Yes, I have heard he is. How is 
he now, doctor ?' Said the physician : 'He has passed the critical 
stage of the disease but he is dying.' 

" 'Dying/ she said. 'I don't understand such a paradox ; you 
say he has passed the critical stages, yet he is dying.' Said the 
doctor, 'Yes, he is dying because of his love for you.' With tears 
trickling down her cheeks she said, 'Follow me, doctor,' and she 
led the way to a florist and purchased as beautiful a basket of 
flowers as money could buy and taste and love could select. On 
a card she wrote, 'With my love.' She said to the doctor : 'Will 
you carry these to Judge Owens ?' He said : 'It will give me great 
pleasure and delight to bear such a message.' 

"When the doctor reached the hospital he found the judge in a 
fitful, feverish slumber. He drew a chair up to the bed and placed 
the flowers thereon and stepped back to await results. Presently 
Judge Owens rolled over and opened his eyes and saw the flowers, 
and he drank in their aroma. He reached out his thin and trans- 
parent hands and lifted the basket and drank long and deep of its 
nectar. He put the basket on the chair just as the doctor stepped 
in front of him. And the judge looked up and smiled and said: 
'I have you to thank I presume, Doctor, for these beautiful flow- 
ers.' The physician said: 'No/ 'To whom, then?' said the judge. 
The physician said : 'Guess.' 'I couldn't.' 'Try.' T couldn't.' T 
will give you three guesses/ Then the doctor said: 'I think, 
Judge, you will find the name of the donor on a card attached to 
the flowers.' 

"With trembling hand he pushed way down into the smilax and 
forget-me-nots and lilies of the valley and pulled out a card. He 
saw the name and the handwriting which he knew and loved 
so well. He looked up and said : 'Doctor, did she write that of 
her own free will, or did you urge her to do it?' The physician 
said: 'Judge, I wish you had seen her when she wrote it, and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 313 

you would not have asked that question.' Then the physician 
left him. 

'The next day when he returned he found that Judge Owen 
had taken a little nourishment. The next day he was sitting up 
with his head on a pillow, the next day he found him propped up 
a little higher. The next day he found him in an invalid's chair 
being wheeled up and down the corridor; the next day he was 
hobbling on two crutches. The next day he was hobbling about 
with one crutch and one cane; the next day with simply a cane. 
The next day the judge could totter without either cane or crutch. 
Nine days later there was a quiet wedding in the hospital annex. 

"I have looked into this old world scarred and damned and 
bruised and cursed by sin, and I have said : 'God, this old world 
is a good deal like a hospital. We have our libertine ward, we 
have our drunkard's ward, and I can see all humanity in this great 
hospital called the world.' 

"Listen, nineteen hundred years ago God leaned over the battle- 
ments and looked down upon us and He took pity upon us. He 
walked out into the garden and plucked lilies of the valley and 
forget-me-nots and entwined them with smilax and to it He fast- 
ened a card and leaned over and dropped it down into the manger. 
The wise men came and found Christ. They read God's love story 
to you, that 'He loved the world/ that 'He gave His only begotten 
Son that whosoever believeth in Him may not perish, but have 
everlasting life.' You can keep out and go to hell. It is up to 
you; if you are not saved it will not be because God does not 
want you to be. 

"Out of the tomb on that Easter morning he came that lost 
might be saved, and I pick upon that for my text: 'Behold, I 
stand at the door and knock.' I don't understand it but I believe 
it. 

"When I was playing baseball I quit and went into the Y. M. 
C. A. The sudden change from the open out door athletic life 
to the indoor life in an office nearly killed me. I quit and went 
up to Lake Geneva to the Y. M. C. A. camp to recuperate. When 
I became convalescent, one day I walked out on the pier. I stood 
there on the pier with the warm sun of an August day shining 



314 Life and Labors of 

down upon me and I looked down into the clear blue water of 
Lake Geneva, and I saw a pebble. The rays of the sunlight fall- 
ing upon it made it shine like a pearl. I said to my friend : 'John, 
isn't that a pearl?' He said: 'No, when the right angle of the 
sun shines upon it you can see something glittering. Many have 
tried to get it but it is too deep. The clear water deceived you.' 

"I said : 'Boys, lets go in bathing.' I hurriedly put on my bath- 
ing suit and walked out on the pier. I said : 'When I was a boy 
in Iowa I often went swimming in the old swimming hole and I 
was a good diver and swimmer. I will get that pearl.' 'But,' 
they said: 'the water is too deep. It is too deep.' 'But,' I said, 
T will try.' And so I filled my lungs and shot down, and down, 
and down I went. 

"With my eyes opened and hands far outstretched I said to 
myself — 'I will get the pearl' Down I plunged and grasped and 
it seemed to smile and say come on, come on. I went down deeper 
and grasped again, but it only smiled and beckoned me to come 
on, come on. I found myself chilled with the cold water from the 
spring and I shivered and said: T don't want to fail, I will get 
it this time.' I plunged deeper and grasped again, but still I failed, 
failed. My breath got shorter, the pressure of the water about 
my head roared as I went deeper. I said, 'Once more, and if I 
fail, I fail,' and I plunged and reached down, whirled and shot out 
of the water. 

"As my head came above the water John said : 'Bill, did you get 
it ?' All I said was : 'No ; it is too deep.' 

"Oh, boys, oh men, hear me, neighbors, hear me ; twenty years 
ago I stood on the shore of God's love. I had heard men tell that 
it was fathomless. I plunged down, and down, and down ; I went 
in rich experience. I won't tell you it is too deep. It is too high 
to scale. I don't understand, I never expect to until God wipes 
the smoke from my vision. I know it is true. During those 
twenty years I have taken over 100,000 people by the hand and 
helped the unsaved to Jesus Christ. I know it is true, I have 
seen it. 

"Jesus, fold this audience in your arms. Jesus, rap loud and 
rap long. He is pounding at your old heart, sinner, until His 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 315 

knuckles are bare. He raps in weakness and in health and He 
raps in prosperity. He rapped when the hearse came up to your 
door and took your wife, He rapped when the white one came and 
took your baby. He rapped when you in your weakness said, 'I 
will come,' but you lied; you did not. Rap loud, and rap long, 
God. Your will is your own; God won't break your will and 
force His way into your heart. Not much. Jesus will rap ; open 
the door and He will come in. If you don't you will go to hell. 

"I want to tell you something. There are many men here to- 
night that have their hands on the door to their heart ; manhood, 
and their respectability, and their wife's prayer, and their mother's 
pleadings, and everything says: 'Let Him in.' Take your stand 
for Jesus Christ. I know men so troubled that they can hardly 
sleep. I know men so troubled that they can hardly attend to 
their business affairs. I know men who are so troubled that they 
can hardly dictate a letter to their stenographers. There they 
stand with their hands on the latch, deciding whether or not to 
open the door and say : 'Come in, Jesus ; I have kept you out there 
until my hair is gray, until I have buried my wife and children. I 
have kept you out there long enough. Come in Jesus.' 

"If you have any manhood, listen. Some say : 'No, I won't let 
Him in.' Some are afraid, some let Him in and shut Him in the 
spare room. Have you ever seen a spare room ? did you ever see 
a spare room? It is usually in the northwest corner, where the 
frost gets that thick on the window. There is not a stove within 
three blocks of it. It is the room you always turn the presiding 
elder or the preacher in when they come to visit you. 

"We had a spare room in our house that had a carpet. There 
was a little bunch of it in front of the bed. It was the only room 
in the house that had wall paper on it. They had wall paper in 
the room with a four-inch border and made to match the carpet. 
The figures in the wall paper and the carpet were green lizards 
and alligators and serpents. It was the only room in the house 
that had any upholstered furniture in it. It had an old hair-cloth 
lounge in it that had done time for generations and was as slick 
as an Illinois politician, and that is going some. That was the 
room in which we always put the wayfarer and the stranger. I 



316 Life and Labors of 

would not sleep in that room if they had given me a deed to the 
farm. Grandfather made the bed ; he made the lathe, and turned 
out the legs. It had no slats and no springs ; it had pegs along 
the rail and we used to string rope across it. It had two good 
old fashioned feather beds on it, so that when you got into it you 
sank down like you were in a drift of snow. Hanging around the 
bottom of it was some of the filigree stuff, what do you call it ? In- 
sertion ; that is what it is, I guess. It always had a spookish look 
to me. That was the spare room. That is where lots of people 
put God. They get their name on the church record, but God 
and Jesus Christ are shut in the spare room. Just so the Devil 
can give card parties in the parlor and use the sitting-room for a 
social beer-drinking. Jesus is shut up there in the spare room 
to give way to the Devil ; that is the reason you aren't a Christian. 

"Hear me, every man and woman in this building who refuses 
to be a Christian, refuses for just one of two reasons: first, be- 
cause of the things that God will bring with Him when he comes 
that they haven't got; or second, because of the things that He 
will cast out if He comes in. Listen to me. If Jesus comes in, 
out goes the whiskey, out goes the cards, out goes your lying, out 
goes your adultery, out goes your blaspheming tongue, out goes 
your foul, smutty stories. If Jesus comes in out goes that un- 
forgiving spirit. 

"If you say, 'Come in,' you will end all that. You are afraid. 
If He comes in He will bring sobriety and He will cast out drunk- 
enness. He will say to the thief, 'out goes thieving and in comes 
honesty.' He will say to the libertine if He comes in, 'out goes 
adultery and in comes virtue.' You don't want Him. You refuse 
to be a Christian because you know He will bring in a lot of things 
you haven't got and throw out a lot of things that you have got. 
Let Him come in. He will throw out the beer bottles and throw 
out the champagne, clean out the lodge. What is that flying 
overhead? It looks like a dove — no, it is just a pack of cards He 
is throwing out. What is that? It looks like a balloon. No, it 
is only a ball-room costume that is being cast out. Jesus will 
clean you out if He comes in. He will clean up your home of 
a lot of things that you have got. 'Behold I stand at the door and 
knock.' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 317 

"You say: 'I don't see how I can forgive/ All right; He don't 
see how He can forgive. I was preaching down in Iowa when 
up the aisle came a woman. The wife of a man who had been 
a Republican candidate for Governor and had been defeated by 
Mr. Boyce. She said : 'Mr. Sunday, come up here and talk to a 
girl. She is on her knees weeping and we can't do a thing with 
her.' And I walked over and looked at a girl with hair like a 
raven, her eyes were black and snapping. She had a straight 
Grecian nose and beautiful symmetry of form. I said: 'Do you 
believe you are a sinner ?' 'I know it,' she replied. 'Do you believe 
Jesus Christ will save sinners?' 'I do.' 'Do you believe he can 
save you?' 'I do.' 'Will you let him in?' 'Oh, I can't.' 'It isn't 
can't, it is won't.' She said, 'I can't.' 'It isn't can't, it is won't. 
You can if you will. Is there any sin you are not willing to give 
up? Are you living in sin any way? Are you committing adul- 
tery? What is the matter? Be honest.' 'No, I can't.' I said: 
'Let him.' She said : 'I can't.' I started to turn away and I said : 
'Is there anyone you are unwilling to forgive?' She looked at 
me and her teeth gritted and she said : 'Don't ask me to forgive 
him.' I said: 'If you forgive not those who trespass against you 
God in Heaven will not forgive you.' She said: 'I can't do it/ 
I said : 'It isn't can't, it is won't/ 

"Listen to me, girls, she jumped up out of her seat and I could 
see her swell out at the chest. I saw the muscles in her neck 
bulge over her collar and I could see her grit her teeth and she 
said to me, 'Then I won't.' I looked at her and saw a vision of 
a soul in hell. God says, 'if you don't, I won't/ 

"I was preaching in another town and there were two women 
who had split the Presbyterian church wide open over some fool 
society quarrel. It had lasted about five years. Before I could 
preach any and have an audience I had to get those two women to- 
gether, was what they told me. One of the principals was a school 
teacher. I thought she was the more religious one so I said to 
her : 'Mrs. C., everybody is talking about the quarrel between you 
and Mrs. D/ She said: 'Mr. Sunday, I have been so troubled 
about that I haven't slept for two nights. I haven't tasted food 
for two days/ I said: 'You go get Mrs. F. and Mrs. H. and 



318 Life and Labors of 

take them up with you and if she receives you all right, and if 
she slams the door in your face, you let her alone ; you won't owe 
her anything, or in other words, let her go to the Devil.' 

"Mrs. C. called me up over the phone and said it is all right, 
everything is all right, and wanted to know what to do. I said 
'I want you two women to come to the meeting together.' Then I 
called up Major Wagnor, who was the chief usher, and told him 
what had happened, and that I wanted him to usher them right 
down in front. The two women came down the aisle arm in arm 
and the crowd arose to their feet and looked, and the people sat 
and looked. As I preached I looked at those two women and the 
tears were trickling down their cheeks, and I saw a vision of a 
soul in heaven. God says, 'forgive the man who trespasses against 
you and I will forgive you.' Why don't you want to let Him in ? 
If you will keep that God will keep you, if you don't you will 
go to hell. 

"He stands outside, knocking at the door. I sat in my room 
in Salida, Colo. I looked out across the great continental divide 
and saw those large mountain peaks throwing their heads fifteen 
thousand feet high, until their snow covered heads and shoulders 
looked like a flock of sheep, feeding on the hillside of the sky. 
As I looked I saw a snow storm. I saw a flake of snow tumbling 
and whirling, swirling, pitching and lunging swiftly down to the 
mountain. It seemed to be so tired that it seemed to say to the 
mountain: T am tired, from my long journey from the sky: I 
want to rest.' 'Oh, rest on me.' Said the little flake of snow, 'Oh, 
but you have got millions now ; if I fall, won't it break you down?' 
The mountain said: 'My foundation is laid upon the bases of 
eternity; come and rest on me/ And the flake swirled and 
tumbled and pitched and fell and there it went to sleep in the 
arms of the mountain. 

"I say : 'Oh, God, I am tired of sin, I have come into the taber- 
nacle a sinner, wan and troubled, and I want to rest. I am 
troubled, thinking all day of what I heard last night, God. Can 
you hold me ?' 'Why,' Jesus says ; 'come on, I have borne sinful 
men for two thousand years.' 'But, Jesus, I have got an awful 
load; the people don't know it.' 'Oh, but,' God says, 'come and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 319 

rest on me, my shoulders are broad and my arms are strong ; they 
will never break.' 

"Come on, boys and men. Twenty years ago I tumbled and 
swirled and pitched and fell and tonight I am resting in his man- 
tle; don't you want to? Will you let him in?" 



"What must I do to be saved?" 

"Paul seemed to live in a perpetual state of revival and con- 
tinuous harmony and unity with God. He had only to come to 
Philippi, the chief city of Macedonia, and immediately, Lydia, a 
seller of purple, believed. He needed only to walk along the 
streets and a girl, possessed with the spirit of divination, or, as 
we would say, who had the Devil in her, walked after Paul and 
Silas, and cried out ; 'These men are servants of the most high 
God, who proclaim unto you the way of salvation.' 

"Paul was grieved because of the manifestation of the devil 
in her and said: T command you in the name of Jesus Christ 
of Nazareth to come out of her.' And the devils immediately 
left the girl, and when her masters saw that the hope of their 
gain was gone, when the dirty, low-down reprobates that had 
been feeding off of her misfortune and sin; when the infamous 
scoundrels, too low down and lazy to work, who had forced her 
out to earn money to buy their food by merchandising her body ; 
when her masters saw the hope of their gain was gone, and that 
she no longer wa: a mere pawn on the chess board of that God- 
less crowd ; now that the devils had been driven out of her and 
Christ came in and that she no longer was merchandise for their 
gain; when her masters saw that the hope of their gain was gone 
and that now she was a free woman in Jesus Christ and would 
no longer follow the old life of sin ; when her masters saw that 
the hope of their gain was gone, then, instead of thanking God 
that the woman had been made decent and made pure; instead 
of thanking God that a slave had been set free ; instead of thank- 
ing God that she had crept and crawled out of the sewers of 
infamy into the glorious liberty of a child of God, they were mad 
at the man whom God had used to set her free, and seized Paul 



320 Life and Labors of 

and Silas and dragged them to the magistrates, who were sub- 
sidized by the infamous gang and cussed rabble that controlled 
this woman and also the crown that controlled the officers. 

"And when they delivered them to the magistrates they said 
to them: These men teach doctrines contrary for us to receive.' 
Certainly the doctrine that you shall have only one wife is con- 
trary to Mormonism. The doctrine that, 'thou shalt not commit 
adultery/ is contrary to the doctrine of the old libertine. 'Thou 
shalt not steal,' is contrary to the doctrine of a thief. Thou 
shalt not swear,' is contrary to the doctrine of the old cusser. 
Certainly these men teach doctrines contrary for us to receive. 
Certainly; certainly. And they were mad at the man that God 
used to set her free. Sure ; sure. 

'The doctrine, 'walk home sober,' is contrary to the whisky 
business. I understand all that. These men teach a doctrine 
contrary for us to receive. Yes, but the dirty scoundrels would 
have been glad to receive the same doctrine as she had, if they 
had had the manhood to receive it. That was the matter — not 
Paul and Silas. It was not the doctrine that they would receive, 
simply because they did not want to live it. Oh, no. Christian- 
ity is all right but you do not want to live it. The trouble with 
you is not religion, not God, not Christ. The church is all right 
but you don't want to square your life by it. 

"So they delivered them over to the magistrates and he gave 
the sentence that they should be put in the inner prison ; and they 
locked them in. And at midnight they sang unto God ; a strange 
sound in that old jail, where there was cursing and oaths and 
no response to prayers. The old jail trembled and rolled like 
a drunken man staggering up the street. And from the walls the 
stones fell and the plastering dropped, and presently the doors 
swung open, and the prisoners all came out in the corridor; and 
the Roman jailer, thinking that all had escaped, was about to 
kill himself, for the law was that if the prisoners escaped his 
life should be forfeited, and he knew how inexorable was the 
Roman law and thought that the prisoners would kill him and so 
thought that he w T ould take things in his own hands, and that 
would be the easiest way to settle it. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 321 

"When Paul cried out : ' Hold ! Do thyself no harm. We 
are all here.' And then he called for a light, for the jailer seemed 
to doubt it, and he sprang trembling before the men and cried 
out in the words of my text: 'Sirs, what shall I do to be saved?' 
What did Paul say ? 

"Go corner the wheat market? Go buy Texas oil stock? Go 
buy stock in a hole in the ground out in Colorado, which they 
call a mine? Go be elected to Congress? Go join a literary? 
Go graduate from a University? No. Go reform; cut out the 
booze. 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.' 

"Now sir, there is here such a beautiful illustration of what it 
means to be saved, that if you will give me your attention I will 
try to make it so plain that if you go out of here unsaved, if 
you have not sense enough to understand what I say, I think that 
God will let you through on the ground of being an idiot. There 
is such a beautiful story that I bring the message. The new 
Testament speaks of salvation. From sickness? 

"The biggest humbug on earth is Christian Science. The big- 
gest humbug on the face of the earth. I am going to rip the 
thing from hell to breakfast some day. I just hate it. Salvation 
from sickness? 'Go in peace, thy faith hath saved thee.' It 
speaks of the prodigal son, speaks of the disciples about to drown, 
and their rescue; it speaks of the enemies of Jesus who walked 
to the cross and tauntingly said: 'He saved others; himself he 
cannot save/ Yes, salvation means bringing men out of a con- 
dition not favorable to their welfare into one that is favorable. 
The salvation of the sick is their health. The apostles about to 
drown were rescued. But the salvation that my text speaks of is 
the salvation from sin. Well, what is sin? 

"Sin is the transgression of the law, and every sinner is liable 
in accordance with the law he breaks, to punishment. But pun- 
ishment brings pain. Everybody shrinks from pain. Nobody 
wants to go to the penitentiary. Why? It is not favorable to 
one's welfare to be deprived of liberty. To be saved means to be 
rescued from punishment. The law stands every time. If a man 
is charged with breaking the law and pleads not guilty and puts 
the county to the expense of summoning a jury and hiring a law- 
21 



322 Life and Labors of 

yer, does that man appeal to mercy or justice? He appeals to 
justice. If he throws himself on the mercy of the court, then he 
appeals to mercy. Well, you swell up and say: 'I am not a bad 
man/ 

"Do you believe that appeals to God's justice? Yes, and you 
will get your fill of it. When I am a sinner, then I appeal to 
God's mercy. Now to be saved means to be rescued from the 
punishment that you have brought upon yourself. Now listen. 
The party that has the right and the power to inflict punishment 
has the right to state the condition upon which you can escape 
punishment. 

"You have broken the law and God is right in inflicting pun- 
ishment. And telling you what to do to escape punishment. 
Therefore God says: Tf you will believe in Jesus Christ, my 
son, and accept Him as your Savior, and turn your back on every 
known sin, I will let you escape punishment which otherwise 
would fall on you/ 

"Now, what must I do to be saved from the punishment? I 
don't want to go to hell, I don't want you to go to hell. Although 
a fellow told me to go there the other day, I told him to pack his 
grip and go if he wanted to. If I die and you have occasion to 
call me up over the phone, my address won't be hell, you can 
bank on that. But I want to tell you that if you don't repent 
there is nothing else left for you. They say of King Charles V. 
that a merchant loaned him a vast sum of money, and the king 
was unable to pay it. The merchant invited the king to a banquet 
and as they sat at the table before the food was carried on the 
merchant called for a silver platter, and ordered a fire lighted 
thereon. And taking the bond or note, he held it in the flames 
until the very last vestige was consumed, showing that King 
Charles was no longer indebted to him. And the king thanked his 
benefactor and congratulated himself that he was lucky enough 
to fall into the hands of such a kind man. You and I are mort- 
gaged to God and the note became due. All our morality in busi- 
ness and culture and things that you pride yourself on are filthy 
rags before God. And when you bring up your righteousness and 
morality and culture and ask God to accept that, God says that it 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 323 

is filthy. Now then we were mortgaged to God. The note be- 
came due and nineteen hundred years ago God invited you to a 
salvation feast. And your sins and mine were laid at the cross 
and now He invites us to accept of the atoning sacrifice made 
through Jesus Christ. And if you do, you will be saved; and if 
you don't, God pity you. And I will witness in the day of judg- 
ment that I preached God's truth to you. 

"It is not possible to be saved without conviction. It shows 
itself in different ways. There is evidence of great need. You 
would display your ignorance. There was a man, Nicodemus, 
who was unmanly enough to sneak to Jesus by night. He was a 
ruler of the Jews, head of the Sanhedrin and a circumspect man. 
And yet there was a sense of great need in his heart. Your 
money, Mr. Merchant, will not satisfy you. Your money, Banker, 
won't satisfy you. And if it does, you have the most parsimonious, 
shriveled-up, dried up, pusillanimous soul God Almighty ever 
made. So if there is a feeling of need, and the pleasures of the 
world are a mockery, come to Jesus Christ and He will satisfy it. 

"Years ago in London there was a famous literary gathering 
at which there was a famous preacher. And a young lady made 
her debut as a vocalist and an instrumentalist, and she charmed 
the audience. And the minister said to her: 'I, together with 
others, have been charmed by your talent and as I listened I 
thought what a power you would be if only you would consecrate 
your talent to the Lord.' And it made her angry and she snapped 
out something cynical and sarcastic. 

" T beg your pardon/ said the minister : 'I only wished to tell 
you how much good you might do.' The evening closed and they 
went to their homes and retired, and this young lady rolled and 
tossed until two o'clock in the morning, and then she arose and 
seized a piece of paper and a pencil, and dropped upon her knees, 
and Charlotte Elliott wrote : 

'Just as I am without one plea, 
But that Thy blood was shed for me, 
And that Thou bidst me come to Thee; 
O Lamb of God, I come ; I come. 5 

"Whatever you need, you come to Jesus Christ and I tell you, 



324 Life and Labors of 

He and He only will supply your need. Sometimes men feel that 
they are unworthy. I like to hear a man offer the prayer of the 
publican : 'God be merciful to me, a sinner.' Now give me atten- 
tion. Some people are saved from great sins. Salvation to some 
men is just as big a change as going out of a dark into a light 
room. Salvation to some men is just as big a change as crawling 
j out of a snow bank and going into a warm room. To other men 
I to become a Christian, does not mean much of a change. Multi- 
tudes of men live good, honest, upright, moral lives. They would 
not have much change to become a Christian. They just lack 
one or two things. That is public acknowledgment. Lots of you 
are good men, honest and moral, and everybody respects you and 
what you lack is only one thing. You probably don't lie and you 
don't swear, and you don't have to quit boozing, so that salvation 
to you would not mean much of a change, but it would mean that 
you would have to come right out in the clear, and publicly avow 
yourself a believer in Jesus Christ, which you have not done. It 
means to the man that lies and swears and is impure, salvation 
means to him a bigger change than to the other person. So you 
see what it means to some is different to what it means to others. 

"I remember hearing John McNeil tell that he imagined that 
the men whose eyes Jesus had opened had a convention and were 
giving their experience. And old Bartimeus said : T was by the 
wayside and Jesus came along and said: "What wilt thou that I 
should do unto thee?" And I said, "Lord, that I might receive 
my sight." And Jesus said unto me, "Thy faith hath made thee 
whole." ' 

"Then another fellow said, That is wrong, you don't get your 
sight all at once. You get it on the installment plan, like we buy 
furniture in Chicago. I was as blind as a bat and Jesus said: 
"Look: What do you see?" and I said: "Nothing." And he said: 
"Look again," and I saw men as trees walking. And I looked 
the third time, and my sight came to me. So you get it little by 
little. And after a while you have it all.' 

"Another fellow said : 'You are wrong ; I was blind and came to 
Jesus and said: "Lord, I want to see," and he looked at me and 
spat on the ground and stooped down and mixed the spittle with 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 325 

clay. And picked up the clay and put it on my eyes, and told me 
to go to the pool of Siloam and wash, and I went and washed and 
as I stooped down to the water, my eye-sight came.' 

"Another fellow said: 'Look here, I can see just as well as you, 
and I never went near a pool.' Jesus healed in as many different 
ways as there were men healed. But faith in Christ was the 
ground work of the whole business. He told the fellow to go to 
the pool of Siloam when he had probably washed there lots of 
times. There was no medicine in the clay. It was just simply 
faith in Jesus Christ that did the whole business. I care not what 
that condition, if you believe in Jesus Christ, you will be saved. 

"You have a consciousness that you have sinned. It is quite 
clear that some men have a deeper conviction of sin after they be- 
come Christians than before. I don't say always, but I know men 
that are like this. I know people that can tell the day that they 
were converted, and others that cannot. I can remember the day 
that I was converted. I can remember the night that I was con- 
verted twenty years ago. Mrs. Sunday cannot remember when 
she was. That does not mean that I am' saved and she is not. 
I can tell you of people who never knew when they were con- 
verted. They are taught of Jesus Christ from their earliest recol- 
lection. Other people can tell the day and the hour. 

"Stanley tells us that he found people in Africa who never 
knew that they were black until they saw white men. And when 
Stanley and his English followers stood before them for the first 
time they knew that they were people of another color that lived 
on earth. I know something about sin to-night, and I expect to 
know something more a year from now. And I will know all 
when I stand in the presence of Jesus Christ. But I turn my 
back on every known sin. You can't be saved without a broken 
and a contrite heart. 

"I went down in an audience in a town in this state and spoke 
to a school teacher, the last one of the teachers in the town that 
was not converted. And I said : 'Miss S., you are the last teacher 
that is not converted. Won't you come and give you heart to 
Christ?' She said: 'Well, I am not going to the front.' Then 
I said : 'You will never be saved until you do. Because until you 



326 Life and Labors of 

do, you have not gotten to the end of your self will yet/ But 
she said: 'I can be saved without going to the front.' I said: 
'You cannot be. If you had not said so that would be another 
thing. You have said to God that you won't, and until you are 
willing to do it, you will not be saved.' 

"You say : 'Well, if I lived in some other town besides Decatur, 
I could be a Christian.' If you couldn't be a Christian in Decatur, 
you couldn't be one anywhere. It is not new surroundings you 
need ; it is a new heart. 

"There was a rich old Russian who had purchased his son a 
lieutenant's commission in the Russian army. This young man 
had dissipated a fortune and one day during the Crimean war he 
sat down and tried to figure out the amount of his indebtedness. 
He drew a line under it and added it up and the sum over- 
whelmed him. He wrote underneath it, 'Who will pay all this?' 
The young man's father was a personal friend of the Czar. That 
night the Czar was walking among the troops reviewing the forti- 
fications and encouraging the troops against the assault of the 
English and French. He saw the son of his friend sitting there 
asleep. He saw lying on his lap the paper. The Czar stooped 
down, picked up the paper and read the figures and then the total 
and then the sentence underneath, 'Who will pay all this,' written 
underneath the figures. The Czar stooped down and signed it 
and sealed it with the royal signet, placed it back and went away. 
After he had gone, the lieutenant awakened and saw the signa- 
ture of the Czar and the royal signet and he was alarmed. He 
showed it to his friends and it proved to be an order on the 
Treasury for that amount. He presented it to the Treasury and 
they refused it unless it came through the regular channels with 
a voucher attached. He made application to the Czar and the 
Czar ordered the Treasury to pay it and discharge the obligation. 

"Say, you can sit down there and you can recall every lie you 
ever uttered ; you can recall every oath that ever fell from your 
lips ; and you can recall every drink of whisky that you ever took 
and you can recall every time you ever cursed your wife and 
every blow you ever struck; and you can recall everything you 
ever practiced of deceit ; and everything that you have done that 



Rev. IV m. A. (Billy) Sunday 327 

is a disgrace to manhood and womanhood and you can pile those 
sins one on top of the other until they make a mountain higher 
than the Rockies; and then in despair for your culture, your 
morality, your science, your education, your business, your bank, 
your store, your learning as a doctor, your learning as a lawyer, 
and all that you have got on God Almighty's dirt you can never 
dissolve that mountain. 

"When you come and stand before God in his glory in utter 
inability to pay and discharge all those sins, you will write those 
words : 'Who will pay all this ?' I would like to write one word, 
the fairest name on mortal tongue, the fairest word in song, 
'Jesus/ 'Jesus/ 'Jesus/ Give Him a chance and He will make 
you clean. Give Him a chance and He will forgive you for 
every oath. He will forgive you for every drunken brawl, and 
for every adultery, and He will give you a chance for every dis- 
sipation, but don't sit there like a bull-neck, and sneer at God and 
say there is nothing in religion. You are a fool, you are a 
fool to do it. Give Him a chance and see if He won't do it for 
you. 

"Listen to me; you have got to be converted if you are ever 
saved. Listen. 'What must I do to be saved?' A man says, 
'look here, I would like to a Christian but I don't understand it. 
I don't think it is so.' I will try to make it clear. I am a farmer. 
We plow the ground and plant the corn and it germinates and 
grows. I can't understand it nor the origin or control of the law 
of nature. Do you understand how the corn grows? No. Are 
you a fool enough not to plant the corn because you can't under- 
stand how it grows ? It is God's business to make the corn grow 
and it is your business to put it in the ground. How the corn grows 
is a mystery. There is no mystery about plowing the ground and 
planting the corn. No. But if you left out plowing the ground 
and planting the corn you would have no corn. I can't under- 
stand it. No ; and I won't understand it until God makes it clear. 
No philosophy and no professor and no scientist and no university 
on earth knows that. That is God's business; it is a mystery. 
All right then, don't butt into God's business, let Him alone. 

"I dig a hole and plant a tree and the tree produces an apple, 



328 Life and Labors of 

and you go out and pick the apple and eat it. Can you make the 
tree grow? Can you make the apple? No. Who did? God. 
It is a mystery ; I don't know how' the tree grows ; I don't know 
how the apple grows; any fool could walk up and pull off an 
apple and eat it but it takes God to make the tree grow and the 
apple grow. You don't know but anybody can eat the apple. I 
can't understand how it grew ; that is a mystery. 

"Accept Jesus Christ, the Savior, and God says I am saved. 
How am I saved? That is a mystery. That is God's business. 
It is my business to turn from sin ; that isn't a mystery. It isn't 
a mystery to quit drinking ; it isn't a mystery to get down on your 
knees and say, 'God, I am a sinner, but I want to be a Christian.' 
Then you do your part and God will do his part. It is God's busi- 
ness to save; that is the mystery. I don't understand it and I 
can't explain it ; I don't have to. You do your part and He will 
do His. 

" 'What must I do to be saved ?' What must I do to get the 
apple ? Plant the tree. What must I do to be saved ? Pray the 
Lord Jesus that you may be saved. You do your part and don't 
make a fuss about it. Leave it to the Lord. 

"In Elgin one night walking down the aisle I saw a fine-cut, 
keen-looking fellow. I walked up to him and I said: 'How do 
you do; are you a Christian?' He said: 'Yes, sir.' I said: 'Did 
you ever accept Jesus Christ?' 'No,' he said. I said: 'Did you 
ever join the church ?' 'No.' 'Then,' I said ; 'you are not a Chris- 
tian/ 'Oh,' he said; 'I am just as good a Christian as you.' I 
said : 'You are not a Christian at all.' 'Oh,' he said ; 'that is just 
a difference of opinion.' 

"I looked at the lapel of his coat and I saw a Mystic Shriner 
button. He was a Mason. I said: 'I see you are a Mystic 
Shriner.' He said : 'Yes, I am a Shriner.' Supposing he would 
say to me, 'Mr. Sunday, are you a Mason?' 'I am/ 'Ever join 
the lodge ?' 'No. I don't need to join the lodge.' 'Ever paid your 
dues?' 'No, I don't need to pay my dues.' 'Ever been initiated?' 
T don't need to be initiated but I am just as good a Mason as you 
are/ He would say : 'Now, you are talking nonsense.' 

"I am talking just as much sense as you are talking. If I stand 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 329 

np here and say I am a Mason, when I have never been initiated, 
when I have never joined the lodge, when I have never paid my 
dues, I am a liar. No matter how much I may believe in Masonry 
I am not a Mason until I have been initiated and until I have 
joined the lodge and have been voted on and have paid my dues ; 
then I have got a right to say, 'I am a Mason.' If I stand up here 
and say that I am a Christian when I have never accepted Jesus 
Christ, when I never confessed to the world, when I never paid 
my dues, I am a liar. I have just as much right to tell you what 
you have to do to be saved as you have to tell men what they have 
got to do to be a Mason. 

"You come to me and say you a member of the labor union. 
In sympathy, yes; in practice, I am not a member of the labor 
union. If I would say I was a member of the union when I have 
never been initiated to their lodge and have never been taken in, 
I could not say that and be right. Neither can you say I am a 
Christian, unless you have done what God tells you to. 

"There are a lot of people that have got their names on the 
church record that are liars, and have never been converted. Some 
people come and accept Christ and cry; some people don't cry. 
There are some people who are sympathetic and emotional and 
other people are cold. Do you mean to say that if a man don't 
weep and sniffle and wipe his nose that he is not a Christian? No. 

" 'What must I do to be saved ?' Listen to me. Here I read, 
'He was baptized/ I want you to understand I am not here 
preaching baptism. I am not here preaching sprinkling, immer- 
sion nor pouring. As an evangelist at a union meeting I try to 
steer clear of everything about which there is any controversy. 
It would not be fair to do it. As an evangelist of a union meet- 
ing I always steer clear of anything about which there is a con- 
troversy. It is my business to get men to take a stand for Jesus 
Christ. I ask these questions, Are you saved? Are you lost? 
Are you going to heaven or are you going to hell? With Jesus 
Christ you are saved, without him you are lost. I am trying to 
hold strictly to that ; that is God's ordinance. 

"If I were a physician and you were sick and you sent for me 
and I came, and after I had diagnosed your difficulty, I would 



330 Life and Labors of 

write out a prescription and tell you to send it down to the drug- 
gist and have it filled. After I have gone you say : 'Let me see 
that ;' and you say 'cut that out, that is bitter ; check that off, that 
is nauseating;' that wouldn't be my medicine at all. 

"First, Jesus Christ diagnoses your difficulty and writes out 
a prescription ; second, 'If thou wilt place thy heart with the Lord 
Jesus Christ and confess with thy mouth, thou shalt be saved.' 

"That is what God tells you to do. A woman said: 'I don't 
need to confess with my mouth, I confess with my influence.' 
M-O-U-T-H don't spell influence; mouth is the biggest part of 
some people, anyway, and God wants your mouth. Confess with 
your mouth the Lord Jesus Christ and believe in thy heart. Be- 
lieve with thy heart and confess with thy mouth. You say to me 
you don't want to confess with your mouth. I tell you Jesus Christ 
don't want you then, if you don't believe in Jesus Christ. 
A friend of mine was in a little town in Colorado one time and 
sitting out in front of the hotel, when down the street came a fel- 
low and a man behind him calling, 'Halt ! Halt !' He had a gun 
and he saw him pull the trigger three times but the gun would not 
go off. The fellow ran across the street and sat down on the side- 
walk. My friend jumped up and said: 'What's the matter?' 
'That is the sheriff trying to arrest an outlaw/ said somebody. 
My friend ran upstairs and got his Colt's gun and came down 
loading it. He said : 'Come on, fellows, let's go out and help the 
sheriff arrest that fellow.' They laughed at him and said: 
'You're a tenderfoot. This town lies in two states and the state 
line runs down the middle of this street. The man is perfectly 
safe over there ; the sheriff is from this county. He had a warrant 
to serve on the fellow but he got across the street to the other 
state. Before he can serve the warrant he will have to go to the 
Governor and get out requisition papers for him and take him 
back across the street into this state.' 

"Here you are over on the Devil's territory. Here is a booze 
fighter. Here is a man who swears. Here is a man who lies. 
Here is a man who mistreats his wife and is not a Christian. 
Now you want to get out of this and over there. If you want to 
be all right that is what you have got to do. If thou wilt be 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 331 

heard by the Lord Jesus Christ you must get in His territory. 
You believe but you haven't got the courage to coniess with your 
lips. You believe but you haven't got the manhood to step out 
in public on the side of Jesus Christ. There you are troubled and 
worried: 'If thou believe in thy heart on the Lord Jesus Christ,' 
that is one step; and 'Confess with thy mouth that God raised 
Him from the dead,' that is the second. Say that, and you are 
taken out of the Devil's kingdom, and are no longer a sinner, 
but a Christian now. 

"Confess with your mouth and take your stand and say : 'Yes, 
I am no longer m the Devil's kingdom and God won't give the 
requisition papers to take me back.' What you want to do is to 
keep away from the line. A lot of fools see how close they can 
keep to it and not cross it. 

" 'Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.' 
Walking with the army don't make you a soldier. Carrying a gun 
don't make you a soldier, nor wearing a blue uniform don't make 
you a soldier. Before a man becomes a soldier he has got to step 
out on muster day and raise his right hand and take his oath to 
defend the constitution and the flag. Going to church don't make 
you a Christian any more than going to the stable will make you 
a horse ? I will tell you what makes you a Christian. It is doing 
what God tells you to. The Lord says: "Believe on the Lord 
Jesus Christ." 

"You have got to let Him in your heart, rule your life, and you 
have got to let Him be an inspiration to your thoughts and con- 
versation and control your actions. Believe on the Lord Jesus 
Christ. On earth His name is Jesus. He came to save people 
from their sins. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Tonight He 
sits on the right hand of God the Father as our mediator. 

"A mediator is somebody that goes between. The traveling 
man is a mediator between the wholesale house and the retailer, 
and the retailer is a mediator between the wholesale house and the 
consumer. The farmer is the mediator between the corn crib 
and the feed box. A mediator is anybody that goes between. 
Now, then, I am standing here tonight as God's mediator. Yon- 
der is God and here sits a sinner. Through me God tells you what 



$2,2 Life and Labors of 

to do to be saved. A mediator is somebody that goes between. 
Jesus is sitting on the right hand of God the Father. Here you 
are, and here sits Jesus Christ at the right hand of God the Father. 
All right. You say I want to be a Christian. You ask God to 
forgive your sins, then Jesus turns and pleads your case before 
the Lord because of His humanity. He understands our side, and 
because of His divinity He understands God's side. 

"I tell you you are a rebel against God and religion. You 
are a rebel against your best friend, Jesus Christ. I am a media- 
tor for Jesus Christ and I am trying to get a settlement and get 
you to say : 'Yes, I will go to Jesus Christ.' I will look to God 
and pray for you. 'Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt 
be saved/ 

"I was down in Evansville, Indiana, and a man there, the chief 
usher, had been an officer in the Union army, and he told me this 
incident. I had heard it before, but I got it first hand from him. 
You remember the old rebel guerrilla who burned the city of Law- 
rence, Kan., and scattered blood and fire in his trail. The Union 
soldiers had captured part of Quantrell's band down in Mis- 
souri and sentenced them to be shot. That was the rule — to shoot 
all guerrillas. They dug a long grave, bandaged their eyes and 
tied their feet and hands and had drawn the Union soldiers up, 
prepared to give the command to fire. He said as they drew their 
guns up the brush parted and out dashed a young fellow about 
eighteen or twenty years old, who cried, 'wait, wait, wait/ He 
ran up breathless and he was covered with the guns of the Union 
soldiers. He came up and breathlessly stepped in front of the 
sixth man standing in line and said: 'Let me take that man's 
place ; I am as guilty as he, I have been with them on all their 
raids. That man has a wife and four children, and I am alone in 
the w T orld ; father and mother are both dead. Let me take his place 
and let him go/ 

"They ordered a consultation and agreed to do it, and they took 
the bandages from his eyes and legs and put them on the young fel- 
low and the soldiers were drawn up in line and fired, and he fell 
dead. Years rolled on. One day in Missouri in a graveyard a man 
was seen to stoop in front of a grave and pull out the weeds and 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 333 

shape it like a grave. He laid a bouquet on top of the grave. A 
fellow walked up to him and said, 'Was that a relative?' 'No.' 
'Was it a friend ?' 'Yes ; the best friend I ever had,' and he told 
him the story. He said : 'I watched where he stood and when the 
soldiers left I went back and dug up the body and marked the 
place and I know I have got the right one. I am a poor man but 
I have saved a little money and come that I might put a few flow- 
ers on that poor fellow's grave.' He laid on the grave the faded 
bouquet and placed a soiled board by the grave which said on it : 
'He died for me.' 

"Years rolled on and this man became prosperous and if you 
will go to that Missouri graveyard today you will find a marble 
monument fifteen feet high and on that monument is this epitaph, 
'Sacred to the memory of him who took my place; he died for 
me/ 

"Sacred to the memory of Jesus Christ who died on the cross 
to open up a plan to keep you out of hell. He is pleading your 
case in heaven tonight. ,, 



334 Life and Labors of 

"Be sure that your sin will find you out." 

"No man can escape from his sins. Every sin that you have 
ever committed or will commit will bring you to account, and 
make you pay. And nobody ever sinned but that it paid. You 
think that because you do wrong and there is remuneration at- 
tached to it that you have succeeded. Don't think that because 
you won $500 in a night gambling you have succeeded. You have 
made a gigantic, stupendous failure. No sin ever paid. And the 
most stupendous folly to possess the mind of man is to suppose 
that it pays to do wrong. 

"There may be those that are here tonight, planning some sin 
after this meeting. Your presence may be simply for the pur- 
pose of throwing off the suspicion of some person. And you 
are just a few steps nearer the place where you will commit some 
sin that will leave a stain upon your name, and if you are, no 
matter what it may be, it won't pay. It will hound and dog you to 
your coffin. The time will come when you would give your arm, 
or eye, if you had only turned away from sin. 

"There are degrees of uncertainty about some things. For 
example, you are not sure but that you will die and that God will 
judge this old world tonight. You are not sure that the sun will 
rise — it has every morning so far — and I should be surprised 
if it didn't — but I am not sure that it will rise, but I am sure that 
your sin will find you out. You do not need to come here or read 
the Bible to find that out. But from the page of every newspaper 
and periodical we know that. Go before the bars of the prisons 
and penitentiaries. The sins of the inmates have found them out. 
On an Egyptian monument was this inscription: The impious 
shall commit iniquity with recompense but not without remorse.' 
It may bring money but it will bring remorse. You cannot escape 
from it. And you are bound to suffer for it. 

If you put your hand in the fire, you will have to suffer for it. 
If you go without food you will have to suffer for it. If you go 
without water you will have to suffer. You know then that just 
as truly, you have got to pay the penalty if you break the moral 
law. You may escape the law but not the consequences. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 335 

"I believe that there are lots that never paid the penalty for 
transgression. But it will find you out in the execution of human 
law. Everything that man touches must be imperfect. Some men 
have an international reputation as thief catchers and others have 
an international reputation for their ability to elude the law. 
But if you stop to think and post yourself as I have tried to do, 
you will find out how few people actually escape. You may 
elude the law possibly for years but something will occur to lead 
to discovery sooner or later. 

"In a town in this state some twenty odd years ago a man went 
and drew some money from a bank and drank freely of liquor and 
got into his carriage and started to drive home, but never 
reached there. In the morning they found the team tired and 
worn at the front gate. But they saw no evidence of a struggle 
and although they searched everywhere there was not the slightest 
trace that could be found anywhere of him. There was a man 
suspected of having committed the crime but the evidence was 
purely circumstantial and he readily proved an alibi. And of 
course the jury acquitted him. 

"A few years later he sold his farm and moved to another part 
of the country. On his farm was a pond that had never been 
known to go dry but a long drought and the heat of the July, 
August and September sun sucked the pond dry, and there, lying 
in the middle, they found a skeleton, and there was a log chain 
about the skeleton. Because of some physical defects — the fore- 
finger on the left hand being missing, and other things, they rec- 
ognized him. And they found on the log chain the initial of the 
man who owned the farm formerly and had been suspected of 
having committed the crime. They began to search for him and 
at last he was found in a western mining district dying of con- 
sumption. There they found him just a few hours before the 
lamp of life flickered out. It had dogged him until at last the 
finger of man pointed in his face. You may escape man but 
you cannot escape God. 

"You would be dumbfounded at how few men escape. You 
may never have to go behind the prison bars — never have to be 
a ward of the state of Illinois. But, my friends, it will find you 



336 Life and Labors of 

out in your body. Many a man today that people never knew 
had committed the sin — all you have to do is to look at his face 
or his body. It is an invariable index. The judgment of sin does 
not always assert itself. Doctors tell me they can always read the 
history of past life of virtue by clearness of skin, in the brightness 
of the eye and steadiness of the heart beat, and the steadiness of 
the nerves. And you can look your fellow man or woman square 
in the eye and not flinch. But listen ; after awhile the old satanic 
driver will whip up his old chargers and with their hoofs they will 
cut tell tale marks on your cheeks. Then the blossoming of the 
almond tree will be turned into snow drifts of despair. And then 
your heart will become a catacomb where all the wriggling, vile, 
venomous serpents of passion are holding high carnival and post- 
mortem over your rotting, stinking sins. 

''Listen: Certain diseases follow as the result of certain sins 
just as naturally as water runs down hill. Certain diseases are 
the inevitable result of certain sins and if I know your disease I 
know what your sin was to get that disease. I don't need to know 
that you did that sin but all that I need to know is the disease. 

"Everybody knows that that is true of certain diseases. And 
there is a very intimate connection — we all know that morality 
is conducive to health and to longevity and eliminates disease 
and that immorality breeds disease. But God says that right- 
eousness gives life and peace, we all know that. 

"We know that morals are eliminators of disease while sin 
is conducive to disease. We know that all sins have physical con- 
sequence. I cut my hand — this breaks the law of nature. A man 
drinks— look at him today. Every sin has a physical consequence 
attached to it. Just see that man that is guilty of adultery or 
that one that steals. Te consequence of sinning is just as insep- 
arable as for one to stop breathing and expect to live. I have had 
come to me young men and women and grey haired men and turn 
pale as they would rehearse their sins. Why have we so many 
broken-bodied and shattered intellects? Simply because of sin. 
Take anger — you can't even get angry without its affecting you. 

"Doctor Coats, of Washington, D. C, an expert, has crystal- 
lized forty-two poisons made from the secretions from the human 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 337 

being while in the height of anger. He has also crystallized as 
many health-giving qualities from the secretion of the human 
body made while the mind is in an attitude of happiness and peace. 
We have learned that lesson. Anger cuts your life short and hap- 
piness is conducive to longevity. 

"We know that let a mother with a nursing child get angry it 
will throw the child into spasms. Now God Almighty is trying 
his level best to teach you that it does not pay to lose your temper. 

"Listen: You eliminate all diseases that are the result of sin 
and you will be surprised how few remain. You just sit down 
and stop and think how many diseases that you know of are the 
result of sin. If man would stop sinning, two-thirds of the suffer- 
ing and the disease would go. And two-thirds of the diseases 
result from sin. Then what a contemptible fool a man is that will 
live in sin, when you know all this. Oh, shucks ! 

"Listen to me. You cut your own throat. You stab yourself. 
We all know that all the misery and sorrow and corruption and 
vileness is the result of sin. All peace, all virtue and nobility and 
greatness are the result of righteousness. And yet men and 
women hate righteousness and love sin. And then you walk up 
and expect me to think you are a man when you love the thing 
that will damn you, and hate that which will bless you. 

" 'Be sure that your sins will find you out.' Of course some dis- 
eases may be hereditary, or they may be the result of accident. 
Some are. I have known cancer to be the result of accident. Not 
all disease is the result of sin — that the individual has committed, 
but God 'visits the iniquity of the parents upon the children unto 
the third and fourth generation/ But as a general rule, my propo- 
sition holds good. If people will quit sinning and all go to serving 
God, we will eliminate such disease. If we eliminate all disease 
that is the result of sin you will be surprised to see how little there 
is left. So why do you go on living in sin ? 

"I stood by the bedside of a man today — a man that for 
years held a high and honorable position in Decatur, trusted and 
honored by you business men. What put him there ? Booze fight- 
ing. And he told me when he went around into the saloons — the 
saloonkeepers, the white-livered scoundrels, cuss and damn him. 



338 Life and Labors of 

What interest have they in him? I stand here to take this man 
by the hand to lead him out of sin. And they stand and cuss and 
damn me, the miserable reprobates. Like a fellow said: 'Are 
you coming to hear Mr. Sunday preach ?' 'No ; I can't stand him, 
he is too vulgar for me.' He said : 'I am not going up there to 
be offended/ Say, I could no more offend that scoundrel than I 
could pour something on the back of a skunk that would make 
him smell sweet. And so sin is the only thing in the universe that 
can permanently damage men, and eternally damn them. 

"Disappointment will worry you and grief sadden you. Adver- 
sity may bring you hardship and you may have to go hungry, 
but, blessed be God, sin is the only thing in the universe that can 
permanently damn you, and leave its mark on your character. 
Sin is the only thing that can do it. It will find you out. Listen ! 
Your moral character sins breed moral ulcers. Some physical dis- 
eases will bring ulcers on your body. 

"I don't think that a festering body is half as bad as a festering 
character. A stinking body is not half as bad as a stinking name. 
Sin will not only rot your body and leave you a physical wreck, 
but it will rot your name and character until people won't trust 
you and will turn you down. That is what sin will do. You 
cannot lie to your wife or to your husband, or to your employer, 
without having a blot in your make-up. You cannot cheat a man 
in business without you are the loser. It leaves a stain on your 
character. 

"If you are known as a liar or a libertine, or if you are a woman 
that is false to your marriage vow, where are you going to come 
in. Now you come with me to the penitentiary at Joliet and I will 
show you a man who about a year and a half ago held an honor- 
able position. He was president of a big bank and thousands of 
poor people deposited their savings with him. He spent his money 
on wine, women, and fast horses. And finally he rifled the bank 
vaults and stole the money and ran away and he fled across the 
sea and they laid hands on him in the streets of Morocco. You 
just go down to the penitentiary at Joliet and go and ask S tens- 
land, president of the Milwaukee Avenue National Bank, if it 
pays. Ask if sin did not leave a rotten character. Go ask Cooke, 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 339 

ex-county clerk of Cook county — ask him if sin didn't rot his char- 
acter. 

"Go down to the Waldorf-Astoria on the eighth floor, and 
there in the southeast corner is a suite of rooms ; there on a bed 
is a millionaire battling with life. Around his bed stands skilled 
physicians and surgeons doing all that skill can bring to bear and 
a retinue of trained nurses standing around watching him, ready 
to wait upon him, and to gratify any want if the physicians give 
their consent. There is a rap on the door and the son of the man, 
with his wife, enter, and stand and look for a little while. The 
father fails to recognize the son and they wait for half an hour. 
And the physician says : 'He is dying/ And the son, accompa- 
nied by the wife, turn and leave the room weeping. 

"They have not been gone long until the mind returns for a 
little while and he asks for them. The wife refuses to come and 
see him die, and they could not find the son. The pupils of his 
eyes dilated and he gasped and was gone. They 'phoned for the 
undertaker and he came in to measure him for the length of the 
coffin, and the proprietor said: 'No, you can't bring a coffin in 
here. The people are superstitious. It would lose us patronage. 
No ; you wait until dark and carry his body out/ 

"So they left him lying on the bed until darkness came on that 
winter night, and then four negroes, two pulling and two dragging 
a wicker basket used to hold soiled linen, came in and they threw 
some soiled sheets and pillow slips and bed spreads in the bottom 
of the basket and lifted his body and dropped it, and covered it 
up with soiled sheets and pillow slips, with bed spreads, and drag- 
ged and pulled it down the hall to the freight elevator, loaded 
with dress-suit cases and trunks, and placed the basket on it and 
it was lowered to the street. They dragged it out to the alley 
where an express wagon was backed up and lifted it in and accom- 
panied by the police they went down Fifth Avenue up to Central 
Park and turned and stopped in front of a magnificent mansion, 
to build which he had spent $5,000,000. 

"There perfumed water flowed from alabaster fountains. There 
the finest statuary the skill of man could carve; there goblin tapes- 
try made in the eighth century, and there a jewel case with dia- 



34° Life and Labors of 

monds and a stomacher for the waist set with precious jewels, 
and a tiara and a sunburst of diamonds. And there were four 
Persian rugs for which he had paid $8,000 in the house. 

"And they carried his body down the street the next day sur- 
rounded by a guard of 100 mounted police, and they placed him in 
the magnificent marble sarcophagus, to build which he spent 
$125,000, and they shoved his body into the vault and turning the 
combination on the great door, they locked him in. The wife 
returned home and wringing her hands, and with the tears run- 
ning down her cheeks, she said: 'I would give all my wealth if 
he could be back in my arms and we could be lovers like we once 
were.' 

"Say, did you go to Chicago to the world's fair and see the 
$150,000 diamond sparkling upon the plush stand in the Tiffany 
exhibit? That diamond was bought by this man and he turned 
from his wife for another woman and built her a $600,000 palace 
and his wife refused to go and stand by his bedside and see him 
die. When Gabriel shall blow his horn, you walk up and ask 
Chas. T. Yerkes, the Chicago street car magnate, ask him if it 
paid to buy that house for the woman that he was living in 
sin with; ask him if it paid. I tell you that sin rots your char- 
acter. 

"Listen to me. You are found out in your conscience. You 
know when you sin. I don't. I look into your faces. I can't 
tell a saint from a sinner. I can't tell a libertine from a pure man. 
I can't tell a thief from an honest man. I can't tell an infidel from 
a Christian. I am glad for you that I can't. I want to tell you 
this though, you can't hide your sins from yourself. You can 
hide it from me and you can hide it from your wife and your 
husband, but you can't hide it from yourselves. You know that 
as you sit there that you would give your right arm if you hadn't 
done that thing. Listen to me. That is part of God's great plan. 
We are so constituted that we know when we do wrong and that 
knowledge brings humiliation. That is the reason men become 
converted. They know they are sinners and it is because God con- 
stituted them in that way. A horse has no conscience. A hog has 
no conscience. Man has ; and a sinner knows what he has done. 



Rev. IV m. A. (Billy) Sunday 341 

"Great God, I tell you there are men and women in Decatur 
tonight that have suffered untold agonies. Men and women in 
Decatur tonight that have suffered veritable hell in memory that 
something they have done in the past will be found out. They are 
afraid as death that their transgressions will be found out, but I 
want to say that there is no physical torment that can equal that 
of conscience. I don't care where you go, prosperity, nor love, 
nor music, nor mirth, nor revelry, nor intoxication will bring nor 
drag out of mind the fact that you are a sinner. 

"I was preaching down in Iowa and a young German and his 
wife who had just landed, had borrowed $65 to pay their fare 
and they were saving it little by little out of their earnings. One 
night they went to the tabernacle and somebody broke into their 
house and stole the chamois-skin bag with the $62 which they had 
saved. It nearly broke their hearts. Oh, how they grieved. The 
poor German's friends and neighbors chipped in and helped to 
make up that amount ; they gave parties and suppers and charged 
a nominal fee for the purpose of raising money to reimburse 
the Germans. 

"They kept their butter and meat and lard in a basket and put 
it under the porch to keep it cold. He had to go to work early 
in the morning and one morning his wife got up and went out 
to get the basket and she found in it a bag and the §62. And tied 
to this bag was this note: T brought back the money I stole 
from you. I have been down to the tabernacle to hear Billy Sun- 
day preach, and I don't want to go to hell. I have brought your 
money back.' 

"Over in a town in this state a man received a letter one morn- 
ing and it read like this: 'My dear friend and neighbor: En- 
closed please find a check for $39 which represents the amount 
that I got for the hogs I stole from you years ago, when we lived 
on the farm, side by side.' 

"His neighbor had some little hogs and they got away and got 
over into this fellow's land and the old fellow kept them. His 
neighbor came and asked him if he had seen any of his hogs. 
All little hogs look alike when they are about that high, and he 
said no, he hadn't seen any. The man kept them and when he 



34 2 . Life and Labors of 

sold the hogs, he kept an account of how much those hogs 
brought. He says : 'Enclosed find check for $39, in payment of 
the hogs I stole from you years ago, when we were on the farm, 
side by side. I have been up to the tabernacle to hear that man 
preach and I want to get the wrongs that I have done in my life 
right.' Conscience said, 'you stole those hogs on the farm twenty 
years ago.' Conscience said, 'you stole that bag and $62.' 

"I was preaching in another town in this state and a young 
fellow came to me and said he had a watch and in the back of that 
watch he had a picture of his mother, the only picture that he 
had of her. One night someone broke in his room and stole that 
watch, which he had hung on the doorknob. I made an announce- 
ment regarding it. I told the fellow who stole that watch that if 
he didn't bring it back he would go to hell. One morning the 
young fellow got up and found the watch hanging on the door 
where he used to hang it, and there was a small note attached to 
it that read like this : 'Here is the watch I stole from you ; I have 
brought it back. Bill said I would go to hell if I didn't bring it 
back/ 

"Listen to me a minute. Your sins will not only find you out but 
God says that your sins will extend to the third and fourth gen- 
eration. You may not like that, but you can't get around it. Lis- 
ten to me. I have here a report of some man about the asylum 
for the feeble-minded at Lincoln. It says the doors in the back 
wards of that asylum are never opened to the public gaze. It 
says a man who enters a ward with those children is as brave as 
the man who entered the cage with a new untrained lion. Those 
men who enter a cage of lions don't display any more courage 
than the man who daily waits upon those foul creatures. These 
feeble-minded, deformed children will fight, it says, because they 
are near the animal. They fall because of the slow communication 
between the eye, the brain and the muscle. It says they are vicious 
because viciousness has been bred in them, that they are lustful 
simply because they are children of uncontrolled passions. Of all 
those feeble-minded children in that asylum at Lincoln, Illinois, 
there isn't one there because of their sins for they are as innocent 
as a babe, but because of the sins of others, and they have got to 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 343 

bear it and babble and mutter to their graves. It says they cut 
their skin and flesh and it heals slowly because their blood is 
poisoned. It says the children fall and their bones break because 
of that condition which they inherited from their fathers and moth- 
ers and grandparents, and the bones knit slowly, if in fact they 
ever reknit. 

"The disease which wrecked their body and their mind is no 
fault of theirs. No, not at all. They are helpless and hapless lives 
there among the inmates of the asylum. They may be trained to 
do a few things automatically, but it is a veritable hell because of 
the sins of their parents. Yet people go and sin. Your sins will 
find you out in idiotic children; your sins will find you out in 
deformed offspring. They have got to go through life murmur- 
ing, muddling and muttering to their graves because of your 
cussedness. Your sins will find you out. 

"The sheriff will lay his hands on you and if you miss him, 
God will lay His hands on you. You may cover it up from men ; 
that isn't all; God will find you out. 

"This isn't all the present. Your sins will find you out when 
you stand before your God. You may laugh at me; and you 
may deride me, you may mock me, and rail and scoff and damn 
me, but just remember what I say, your sins will find you out. 
What are you going to do ? Flee to Christ ; He will forgive you 
for your sins although you have to carry a physical consequence 
of it to the grave. 

"No one is a child of God unless he accepts Jesus Christ. I 
don't care if he is a rich or poor man, to be converted he has got 
to come down and get down on his knees and accept Jesus 
Christ as his Saviour. God hasn't got one plan for the rich man 
and another for the poor man, and if some of you men walk down 
the aisle, how the people would cheer. All right, and if a poor 
man comes down the aisle, you would hardly notice him, but there 
is no such thing as a millionaire in heaven, friends. 

"Jesus Christ would smile a little broader to see a girl crawl 
out of a house of ill fame, and walk down the aisle and give her 
heart to Jesus Christ, as I saw them do in Bloomington. I saw 
eleven of them do it out of one house in a town in Michigan ; it 



344 Life and Labors of 



depopulated the houses of ill fame and closed three of them up. 
I have seen them transformed by the power of God. The rich 
and the poor alike can become children of God only by repenting 
of their sins and accepting Jesus Christ. 

"The rich are afraid to lose their money. Some people are 
afraid to lose their friends. Some people are afraid they will lose 
their job, but a Christian has no fear because they know all is 
well between you and God. Listen to me ! Sometimes the Devil 
comes to me and says: 'What would you do if your wife was 
taken away? What would you do if you got a telegram saying 
Helen was sick or George was ill?' Well, what would I do? I 
don't know. I don't like to borrow trouble. I don't know what 
I would do. The Devil has come to me this week and he says : 
'What would you do if you would lose your voice and have to quit 
preaching? What would you do?' I don't know a thing I could 
turn my hand to to earn the house rent if I was to quit preaching. 
I have given all my time and all my study and all my thought to 
preaching Jesus Christ to people. I don't know anything I could 
turn my hand to to earn the house rent. I don't suppose I will 
lose my voice, I don't believe I will. I don't think God will let 
me lose my voice. Some people are afraid because the people will 
persecute them, afraid people at the store will persecute them, 
afraid, afraid. I know this, I am going to live forever with God. 
It is great to know that. 

"I expect there has been ten doctors come to me since I have 
been in Decatur and said : 'Mr. Sunday, you can't live five years 
at the speed you are going,' and the most liberal have put it at 
ten years. How long will I live to preach. I never expect to be 
an old man. I never expect to be old because I use up more 
energy in a sermon of one hour long than a working man uses 
up in twelve hours' manual labor. When he is through, he can 
lie down and sleep. I can't. The blood in my brain works like a 
trip-hammer. When I lie down, I go over every sermon I preach. 
I preach it all over. I see the faces in front of me. I am semi- 
conscious of everything that goes on here, every sound that goes 
on. 

"You never looked into the face of a man that works harder 



' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 345 

and sleeps less and eats less and yet keeps going. I marvel at 
that myself. These things all come to me. But I know this much, 
I am a child of God and I am going to live forever. 

"I am burning up to do you good and keep you out of hell. 
I don't have to go out and work like this. I do it because I want 
to help you. I can go out on the Chautauqua platform and earn 
enough in one month to keep my family for a year. I turned down 
an offer of $50,000 for five years' work, just working July and 
August and the last week in June, if I wanted to do that. I can 
make $500 a day on the Chautauqua platform. I don't have to 
work like this. I pay $800 a month to these helpers who are with 
me, out of my own pocket. I didn't ask the preachers to do that 
and I didn't ask a guarantee for that much. I do it for your 
good. I am trying to help you to turn away from sin and turn to 
God. If you will give your heart to God all things will become 
new and he will forgive your sins." 



"If you love me, keep my commandments ; 
and I will pray the Father, and he shall give 
you another Comforter that he may abide with 
you forever." 

"A great many people suppose after they have accepted Jesus 
Christ as their Savior and have made a public acknowledgement 
of Him and joined the church, that is all there is to the Christian 
life. That is simply the beginning. Those are only the steps 
that carry you over the threshold into the palace of the king, and 
all the rooms on the interior yet remain for you to explore. I 
believe there is constant and increasing blessing for you. My 
message is concerning the necessity of Christian submission to 
God and without the possession of which you will be of no earthly 
value in the world, or church. You will simply make up a crowd 
in the church on Sunday and as a spiritual force you are a non- 
entity. The Holy Spirit is a personality. The Holy Spirit is here 
and this is His dispensation, and you can't find a verse in scripture 
that He has ever left the world, since He came into it. He be- 
came a regenerative force at Pentecost and this is the last dis- 



346 Life and Labors of 

pensation. This is the needed blessing for the Presbyterian elder, 
Methodist steward, Congregational prudential committeeman, 
Episcopal vestryman, Baptist deacon, Christian elder, Sunday 
school teacher. I don't know of one blessing God withholds from 
you that He gives to the preacher. God hasn't one standard for 
him and another one for you. 

"I have got just as good a right as you have to fill up on beer, 
go to a ten-cent leg show and play cards — as you have. But if I 
did, you wouldn't care a snap for my religion, and I don't care a 
snap for yours. You just disabuse your mind of the fact as quick 
as you can, that you can live like the Devil while the preacher has 
to behave himself. Be what you profess, or profess what you 
are. A friend of a professor asked him what he understood 
about the Holy Spirit and he said : 'It is an influence emanating 
from God.' The friend explained to him the matter of the per- 
sonality of the Holy Spirit and his work. Eight months after- 
wards he saw the professor and asked him how about the Holy 
Spirit now, and the professor said: Tn twenty-two years I did 
not win a soul for Jesus Christ, and in these six months I have 
won sixty-two students.' 

" T will pray the Father and he shall give you another Com- 
forter.' 'Keep my commandments and I will know that you love 
me.' We know love by what it does. That is the reason a lot 
of you are going through this world perfectly useless. You have 
never had an experience. It is because you are not willing to pay 
the price. Tf you love me, keep my commandments and I will 
give you another Comforter.' There must be a special anoint- 
ing of the Spirit of God for public work. The Spirit of God 
was here before Pentecost, but was not here as a regenerative in- 
fluence. He is here this morning. He will make your weakness 
power. He will make your barren life blossom as a rose. He is 
closer than the friend by your side. There is a group in every 
church that is tired and sick of being simply 'a church member,' 
of having church membership stuck away in their desk as a life 
insurance policy against the eternal burnings in hell. Four out 
of five with their names on a church record are doing nothing to 
bring people to Jesus, but doing all they can to send people to hell. 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 347 

"Will Pentecost be repeated? Yes, when the church meets the 
condition. It will come only through submission to God and the 
renunciation of the world, the flesh and the devil. It must come 
through the church ; it will not come through the brothel, the 
saloon, the gambling hell, or your literary. You had better not 
be born than to have your name on the church record, and go to 
the Devil. You strain at a gnat and swallow a camel. You strain 
at my eccentricities and idiosyncrasies, and you go out and drink 
four gallons of beer at some party. You strain at my eccentrici- 
ties and go home and carry home a prize from some church 
gambling crowd who are straining at a gnat and swallowing a 
camel. 

"The church needs Pentecost. It is not my intention to say 
anything harsh against the church. I love her with every drop 
of my blood, with every molecule, vein and artery within me. I 
don't propose to say the things that sap her life or that will please 
the crowd, that will turn her into hell's incubator to hatch devil's 
brood. We say that love is blind. No; love has the eagle eye,, 
and I love the church, and I want to cut off the barnacles that 
destroy the grubs that infest the tree of life. I will not be blind 
to the weakness, and I will rebuke the minister who plays into the 
hands of the gang of card players. 

"What is the cure for the evils of the church ? Not money and 
numbers nor new members, but the gang made over. Many of 
the churches are wrong in their financial policies. We have tricks 
that would shame the Devil, oyster soups, necktie socials, devil 
sandwiches, an olive with red pepper stuck in it. If people were 
not so stingy we would have plenty of money to meet the current 
expense. We live in the richest state, and in the richest part of 
the state of the richest country that God's eyes ever saw or his 
hands made. And we never knew anything about hard times. I 
have been giving a tenth and I have been a lot more prosperous 
than when I hogged the whole thing. I get a lot more money (I 
don't say it boastingly). There are lots of you fellows that could 
buy and sell me fifty times. (Fifty — pshaw !) 

"As individuals, we need Pentecost. God must make connec- 
tions with the world through the church. The trouble with the 



348 Life and Labors of 

church of God today is that it reaches out to save this old world 
through the bottom of a beer glass and you are up against it. 
And when you set up to a card party you check up with the 
Devil's chief instrument, and then your lips are locked and you 
can't do personal work. Lot pitched his tent towards Sodom. 
He moved in and then Sodom moved into him. In twenty years 
he lost influence with his wife, his daughters and his sons-in-law. 
God told him to get out ; He was going to destroy the city. His 
sons-in-law and daughters gave him the "ha-ha" and said the 
idea of God revealing himself through old Lot. They knew him. 
People say the idea that God would speak through some of you, 
they know that your life is not right. He lost influence with his 
wife and she rubbered and God turned her into salt. 

"Now I tell you somebody says that it is a matter of election. 
I believe with Henry Ward Beecher. Election is a matter of 
voting for self. If you are a bold, card-playing, beer-drinking, 
bell-weather debutante, with grizzled hair, painted face, penciled 
eyebrows, it is because you choose to be such. You are no earthly 
good. You fill a little space on Sunday morning and that is all 
you amount to. I believe with Moody that the elect are "who- 
soever will," and the non-elect are whosoever won't. You can go 
to heaven or you can go to hell just as you want to. 

"Did you go to the world's fair in Chicago? Did you go to 
the electrical building? In front of the ponderous doors which 
the strength of a man could scarcely open, lay a big wire door 
mat. This mat was so arranged that the weight of a person who 
stood upon it, made an electrical connection which opened those 
massive doors. Even the weight of the little child that stood 
there was enough, and the doors would swing open. There are 
36,000 promises in the Scripture and they belong to every man 
and woman of faith, and when a man or woman believes and 
obeys, every barrier to God is burned away and every obstacle 
flees. You say perhaps it is a little thing that keeps you from 
God. There are no little things. Prof. Forbes, the entomologist, 
says there are 161,000 acres of corn destroyed in five counties in 
Illinois by the white grub and the corn root grub, and that takes 
no account of what is partially destroyed. He estimates each 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 349 

year grubs destroy 600,000 bushels which would be worth, at 40 
cents a bushel, $250,000. This is the loss of the people of five 
counties in the corn belt of Illinois. 

"Through three tiny insects, the Legislature has appropriated 
$25,000 to find means to destroy these grubs, and yet we will allow 
things to go on that will damn our children, fill our jails, make 
our young people idiotic, and we say: keep hands off the double 
distilled, damnable business that propagates more cussedness than 
anything this side of hell. 

' T would like to read you a lecture on birds. The fact is we 
would starve in three years if it were not for the birds. And yet 
you take your old blunderbuss and go out and shoot a crow be- 
cause he pulls up a few hills of corn and he is worth 10,000 times 
the value of the corn he pulls up in the vermin that he destroys. 
You think you have done a great thing when you have killed a 
chicken hawk that might carry off an old hen that wouldn't cook 
tender in four days ; when you ought to be willing to let him take 
toll once in awhile for the gophers and rodents that he carries 
away. If it were not for the orioles and the yellow hammers 
and the robin and the purple martin, and the wrens, we would 
have no fruit. 

"A robin will feed her brood three thousand bugs in a day. A 
purple martin was kept without food until the craw was entirely 
empty, marked and turned loose, and in one hour he was shot and 
he had in his craw 3,500 mosquitoes. The insects are little things 
but they would bring us to starvation were it not for the birds. 

"And so the little things keep us from God and destroy our 
Christian life. There is too little communion, too little family 
prayer, too little knowledge of the Bible, and our children go to 
the devil. Why this ignorance ? If some of these literary women 
had been asked to make a summary of the latest novel they could 
have done it but if you ask them to quote four verses from Paul, 
they could not do it to save their gizzard. 

"In London the body of a woman who had passed away was 
brought into the crystal palace and lay there in state. Hour after 
hour, an endless stream of people passed the coffin, members of 
the royal family, the Prince of Wales, members of the house of 



35° Life and Labors of 

commons, lords, and men and women of low degree ; finally there 
came in a woman evidently from the haunts of poverty, clothed 
in rags, her toes through her shoes, her head enveloped in an old 
fascinator. She carried one child and led another; when she 
came to the coffin, she put the children on the floor, clasped her 
hands over the top of the casket and kissed the glass above the 
face of the woman, sleeping within. The guard came hurriedly 
up and told the woman to move on, that she was blocking the 
way, but she said: 'I won't.' But he said: 'You will have to, 
madam, you are obstructing the passage.' She said : 'I won't. I 
came sixty-five miles to see the face of the womna who saved my 
two boys from a drunkard's grave, and now I have a right to 
look on her face.' 

"The woman sleeping within was Mrs. Booth, mother of the 
Salvation Army, who did more, perhaps, than any other woman, 
to rescue the drunkard and the harlot and to tear the shackles 
from the lives of men and women who were bound. I would 
rather have a woman who had been a harlot, and a man that had 
been a drunkard and a libertine, stand by my coffin when I am 
dead and look into my face and say: 'He saved me from hell,' 
than to sit down on a throne and sway a scepter that was blood- 
stained, or have a monument of pure gold studded with diamonds, 
sapphires and rubies. And it may be said of you as you go up 
and down that you have rescued many a fallen one if you will 
but submit your life to God." 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 351 



"Rejoice, O young man in thy youth, and let 
thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, 
and walk in the ways of thine heart and in the 
sight of thine eyes; but know thou, that for all 
these things God will bring thee into judgment." 

"There are two or three questions that I would like to ask you 
that upon a satisfactory answer would determine your education 
as I listen and you preach. First, are you kindly disposed towards 
me ? Do you say what you do because you want to help me to be 
better? If you do you- had better practice what you preach. 
God knows that I would give every drop of blood in my body to 
see you be disposed to help men to do right. Second, do you prac- 
tice what you preach ? Third, do you know what you af e preach- 
ing about ? For the last twenty years I have been a Christian and 
I defy any man to look through my life and find that it does not 
come up to the teaching of God. 

"I was bred and born on a farm and I know what it is to earn 
an honest dollar. I have been up against the seamy side of life, 
too, and I know what I am talking about. I know what hard 
knocks are and I battled my way up to this platform, and it is 
my desire to help you men to be better men. One fellow comes up 
and says : 'Are you going down to the tabernacle this afternoon ?' 
'No ; I don't want to go because I can't take my wife.' You old 
scoundrel, you have been a good many places where you wouldn't 
take your wife. Another fellow says: 'Are you going down to 
the meeting?' 'No; Bill is too much of a damn fool for me.' If 
I was as low as that young buck is I would be going some. If 
I could get a young buck like that to come around here this after- 
noon I would drill him full of holes. 

" 'Rejoice, young man, in thy youth.' Men start out for pleas- 
ure, but the life of pleasure will soon come to an end. The Devil 
won't let many stop to think of its consequences. Some men 
think that to be a Christian you have to be a sort of feminine dish- 
rag sort of a fellow. Don't you think that because a man is a 
Christian, that he is effeminate. When I was playing ball I could 
run a hundred yards in ten seconds and I could run the bases in 
fourteen seconds after the crack of a pistol. I could do that 



35 2 Life and Labors of 

before I was converted and I think I could do it just as easily after 
I was converted. ^ 

"When I was in Terre Haute, Ind., I had occasion to visit one 
of the banks in that city. I went to the bank and was introduced 
to the president. I spoke about the beautiful decorations and 
mosaic floor and the ceiling. They said: 'Have you seen our 
vaults?' And I told him I had not and he told the cashier to let 
me in and see them. There were three of them. I went into one 
and nobody watched me. I could have filled my pockets with five 
dollar gold pieces, but they trusted me because they knew I was 
preaching the gospel and that I was living according to that 
book. If a man preaches and believes the gospel, it makes him 
trustworthy. Christianity is character and character is your cap- 
ital. Character is what God and your wife and your children 
know you to be ; reputation is what the people say and think about 
you. 

"I used to play ball. I played center and left field on the old 
Chicago white stockings. I don't believe their equal was ever 
known and I am sure their superior never was. We played all 
one season, with eleven men. We only had two pitchers, Clarkson 
and McCormick, and I will tell you those eleven men used to play 
ball. One time twenty years ago I walked down a street in Chi- 
cago in company with some ball players who were famous in this 
world, some of them are dead now, and we went into a saloon. It 
was Sunday afternoon and we balled up. We walked on down 
the street to the corner where Siegel & Cooper's store is now. 
It was a vacant lot at that time. We sat down on the curbing. 
Across the street a company of men and women were playing on 
instruments — horns, flutes and slide trombones — and the others 
were singing gospel hymns that I used to hear my mother sing 
back in the log cabin in Iowa, and back in the old church where I 
used to go to Sunday School. And God painted on the canvas 
of my recollection and memory a vivid picture of the scenes of 
other days and other faces. Many have long since turned to dust. 
I sobbed and sobbed and a young man stepped out and said : 'We 
are going down to the Pacific Garden Mission; won't you come 
down to the Mission? I'm sure you will enjoy it/ 






Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 353 

"I arose and said to the boys: 'I bid you good bye/ and I 
turned my back on them. Some of them laughed and some of 
them mocked me; one of them gave me encouragement; others 
never said a word. Twenty years ago I turned and left that 
little group on the corner of State and Madison Streets and walked 
to the little mission and dropped on my knees and gave my heart 
to Jesus Christ. I went over to the South side of Chicago and 
joined the Jefferson Park Presbyterian church. The next day I 
had to go out to the ball park and practice. Every morning at 
ten o'clock we had to be out there and practice. I never slept 
that night. I was afraid of the horse laugh that the gang would 
give me because I had taken my stand for Jesus Christ. I walked 
down to the old ball grounds. I will never forget it. I slipped 
my key into the wicket gate and the first man to meet me after I 
got inside was Mike Kelley. 

"Kelley had a heart in him as big as a woman, and he came up 
to me and gave me words of encouragement. Up came Anson, 
Peffer, Clarkson, Flint, Jimmy McCormick, Burns, Williamson, 
Dalrymple and George Gore. George was the fellow that I was 
most afraid of. He came up to me and I saw a tear glisten in 
his eye, and I knew that I had his sympathy and a great load rolled 
off my shoulders. There wasn't a fellow in the gang who 
knocked ; every fellow had a word of encouragement for me. 

"That afternoon we played the old Detroit club. We were neck 
and neck for the championship. That club had Thompson, Rich- 
ardson, Lowe, Dunlap, Hanlon and Bennett, and they could play 
ball. I was playing right field and Clarkson was pitching. He 
was as fine a pitcher as ever crawled into a uniform. Clarkson is 
in an insane asylum today; he don't know his wife nor any of 
his children. What put him there ? Cigarettes. I have seen him 
smoke twelve to fifteen boxes a day, and when he crawled out of 
the baths at Hot Springs I have seen the nicotine that thick on 
the water, and it is because of those cigarettes that John is crazy 
today. We had the Detroit club beat three to two at the last half 
of the ninth inning. We had two men out and they had a man on 
second and one on third, and Bennett, their old catcher, was at 
the bat. Bennett lost his legs under a Missouri Pacific train. He 



354 Life and Labors of 

staggered under a train and it cut off both legs. He is running a 
cigar store in Detroit today. Charley had three balls and two 
strikes on him. Charley couldn't hit a high ball ; I don't mean a 
Scotch high ball, but he could kill them when they were down 
about his knees. I hollered to John and I said : 'You know, keep 
her up and we have got 'em.' You know every pitcher digs a 
hole in the ground where he puts his foot when he is pitching. 
John stuck his foot in the hole and he went clear to the ground. 
Oh, he could make them dance. He could throw overhand and 
the ball would go down and up like that. He is the only man on 
earth I have seen do that. John went clear down and as he went 
to throw the ball his right foot slipped and the ball went low 
instead of high. 

"I saw Charlie swing hard and heard the bat hit the ball with 
a terrific blow. I saw the ball rise up in the air and knew that it 
was going clear over my head. I could judge within ten feet of 
where the ball would light. I turned my back to the ball and ran. 
The field was crowded with people and I yelled: 'Stand back!' 
and that crowd opened like the Red Sea when Moses stood on the 
bank. I ran on, and as I ran, I made my first prayer; it wasn't 
theological, either, I tell you that. I said, 'God, if you ever helped 
mortal man, help me to get that ball.' I ran and jumped over the 
bench and stopped. 

"I thought I was close enough to catch it. I looked back and 
I saw it going over my head, and I jumped and shoved my left 
hand out and the ball hit it and stuck. At the rate I was going 
the momentum carried me on and I fell under the feet of a team 
of horses. I jumped up with the ball in my hand. Up came John 
Hill and Tom Johnson ; Tom is now mayor of Cleveland, Ohio — 
likely to be the next President of the United States. He said: 
'Here is ten dollars, Bill ; buy the best hat in Chicago. That catch 
won me $1,500. Tomorrow go and buy yourself the best suit of 
clothes you can find in Chicago." I believe God helped me to 
catch that ball. 

"I had a contract to run Arlie Latham a hundred yards for 
$500 on a side and all the gate money. I was the fastest runner 
in the National league. Latham was the fastest in the American 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 355 

association. I could run a hundred yards easy in ten seconds 
without any special training. I went to Cap Anson and said : 'I 
will have to go back on you on that race ;' I said, 'you know I am 
a Christian now, and have joined the church.' Anson said : 'Bill, 
don't crawfish now.' 

"I said : T think I can beat him easy ; I am not crawfishing, but 
that isn't it ; we will have to run the race on Sunday and I can't 
do it/ He said : 'Bill, I have $5,000 bet on you ; some fellow at 
Pullman has $12,000 bet on you, and by the time you get down 
there to run the race, your friends will have $75,000 or $100,000 
bet on you.' He said : ' Bill, go down and run that foot race and 
fix it up with God after you get through.' 

"I went to St. Louis and I ran Latham and I beat him fifteen 
feet in a hundred yards. I came back to Chicago the next day 
with $1,500 in my pocket. I never had any money that did me 
so little good in my life. I went before the session of that church 
and I told them the circumstances and I said: 'If you will for- 
give me I will never give you an occasion to refuse me as long 
as I live.' They said: 'William, we will do it' Six years ago 
this spring the Presbyterian synod laid their hands on my head 
and ordained me a preacher, and I have never seen the inside of 
a seminary. I tell you that is going some for an old sport. 

"Listen; Mike Kelley was sold to Boston for $10,000. Mike 
got half of the purchase price. He came up to me and showed me 
a check for $5,000. John L. Sullivan, the champion fighter, went 
around with a subscription paper and the boys raised over $12,000 
to buy Mike a house. They gave Mike a deed to the house and 
they had $1,500 left and gave him a certificate of deposit for that. 
His salary for playing with Boston was $4,700 a year. At the 
end of that season Mike had spent the $5,000 purchase price and 
the $4,700 he received as salary and the $1,500 they gave him and 
had a mortgage on his house. And when he died down in Penn- 
sylvania, they went around with a subscription paper to get money 
enough to put him in the ground. Mike sat there on the corner 
with me twenty years ago when I said, T bid you good-bye.' 

"Williamson was the short stop, a fellow weighing 225 pounds 
and a more active man you never saw. When Spalding took 



356 Life and Labors of 

the two clubs around the world I was the second man they asked 
to sign the contract. I was sliding to second base one day, (I al- 
ways slid head first) and I hit a stone and cut a ligament loose in 
my knee. I got a doctor and had my leg fixed up and he said to 
me: 'William, if you don't go on that trip, I will give you a 
good leg/ I obeyed and have as good a leg today as I ever did. 
They offered to wait for me at Honolulu and at Australia. 
Spalding said, 'Meet us in England and play with us through 
England, Scotland and Wales.' I didn't go. 

"Williamson went with them and while they were on the ship 
crossing the English channel, a storm arose and the captain 
thought the ship would go down. Ed dropped to his knees and 
prayed and said : 'God, bring this ship safe into a harbor and I 
promise to quit drinking and be a Christian.' God abated the 
storm and the ship went into the harbor safely. They came back 
to the United States and Ed came back to Chicago and started a 
saloon on Dearborn street. I would go through there giving 
tickets for the Y. M. C. A. meetings and would talk with him 
and he would cry like a baby. I would get down and pray for 
him, and would talk with him. When he died, they put him on 
the table and cut him open and took out his liver and it was as 
big as a tobacco bucket. Ed Williamson sat there on the street 
corner with me twenty years ago, when I said : T bid you good- 
bye/ 

"John Ward is another who sat on the street corner with me 
that day and John Ward is now one of the leading attorneys for 
the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company. Frank Flint, our old 
catcher, who caught for nineteen years and drew $3,200 a year 
on an average. He caught before they had chest protectors and 
masks and gloves. He caught bare handed. Every bone in the 
ball of his hand was broken; you never saw a hand like Frank 
had. Every bone in his face was broken and his nose and cheek 
bones, and the shoulder and ribs, had all been broken. Frank 
was discharged from the Chicago club because he would drink 
and nobody else wanted him. He used to hang around a saloon 
all the time. Many a time I have found poor old Frank asleep on 
a beer table. I turned my pockets wrong side out and dumped 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 357 

every cent I had on the table and said: 'Frank, you can always 
look to me for half of what I have. I haven't as much now as I 
had when I was playing ball.' Then I was drawing $5,000 and 
$7,000 a year and was offered $1,000 a month if I would play ball. 

"His wife left him and one day he staggered out of a saloon and 
was seized with a paroxysm of coughing. His wife happened to 
meet him and the old love for him returned. She called a car- 
riage and summoned two policemen and they carried Frank to 
her boarding house. She summoned five physicians, the best phy- 
sicians that money could buy, and said — 'Men, men, save, save, 
save Frank.' They said : 'Mrs. Flint, we can't, we can't. 

"Frank heard them and he said: 'Send for Bill.' I hurried 
over to the house and as I stood beside his bed he reached up his 
left hand and reached it around my neck and drew me down to 
him. He said : 'Bill, there is nothing that gives me so much com- 
fort as to have you come down on an occasion like this. I can see 
the crowd hissing when I strike out and they need a run, and I 
can hear them cheer as I catch a foul tip, or throw a fellow out 
on the base. But it don't do any good now when I come to a 
time like this — ' Frank coughed, and his life went out. Frank 
Flint sat on the street corner with me twenty years ago when I 
said, 'boys, I am through.' 

"I stand before you, honorable citizens of Decatur and Bloom- 
ington, and the surrounding towns, and I ask you to lead a better 
life and leave the Devil. Say, 'I am through, I am through, by 
the grace and help of God Almighty/ I tell you boys, I wish my 
mother had been well enough to have been here this afternoon. I 
have helped to put those gray hairs in her head and I have caused 
that body to be bent over and I have caused those long wrinkles 
in her sweet old face. But I say to her: 'Mother, sit at your 
ease and comfort, the rest of your days/ And I am trying my 
best to atone for them. I have seen my mother standing in the 
door- way of that little home in Iowa, with her hands up to her 
eyes, watching for the tramp of the 23d Iowa, returning home 
from the battlefield. But that will never happen. Father sleeps 
beneath the palmetto trees of the South and I will never see him 
until I meet him in that great beyond when I stand before God." 



358 Life and Labors of 



"What shall the end be to them thai obey not 
the gospel of God?" 

"No book ever came by luck or chance. Every book owes its 
existence to some being or beings and within the range of human 
intelligence there are but three beings — good, bad and God. All 
originate in intellect. But all intellect can comprehend must orig- 
inate from one of these three sources. This book cannot possibly 
be the product of evil, wicked, vicious, designing men, for it brings 
the heaviest penalties against sin. Like produces like, and if wicked 
men had produced this book you would naturally expect it would 
make men and women vicious who followed its precepts, but 
you know it is the head light of all progress and you know that if 
the teachings of that book were followed there would not be a 
drunkard, libertine, or thief; there would be none of it; and no 
fattening and gormandizing off the misfortunes and sins of others, 
and peace would reign in this grand and glorious land. This book 
could not possibly be the product of bad men, for they do not 
produce those beautiful sentences. They say too: 'Holy men 
spake as moved by the Holy Ghost.' The only one any intelligent 
being could ascribe this book to is God. Here is found that which 
as far exceeds the combined efforts of man as the sun exceeds 
in brilliancy these electric lights which are a base imitation. 

"And I cannot understand how any man or woman will spend 
their time idly dreaming over the Lady of the Lake or studying 
Emerson, Herodotus, Bacon, or Shakespeare or Byron, when all 
combined, cannot touch the hem of the garments of that book. 
And the one inevitable sign of the degeneration of our day is the 
lamentable ignorance regarding the Word of God, which has 
incontestably the finest English ever written. Professor Phelps, 
of Yale College, said if he had his way he would require and 
demand that every candidate for admission to the college should 
pass an examination on the English of the Bible. He said : 'Go 
through the colleges today- and examine the graduates upon 
knowledge of the Bible and it would be the most magnificent con- 
tribution to American humor and fun, that the world ever looked 
upon.' 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 359 

"It is to your credit not to know something about a lot of the 
novels that belch out from the press of the land. But not to your 
credit not to know of the Word of God. Without this book we 
would not know of our original destiny, except from nature, or 
reason, either, or both of which, would be unsatisfactory. There 
is in this book where I come from and go to. Most men believe 
in God and they are fools if they don't. They believe that there 
is a principle of justice that will reward right and punish wrong. 
No difference what attitude you take toward me— what I say 
comes from the Word of God — not human intelligence. 

"This condition of Israel was disheartening. Peter cried out 
but that did not seem to move them. He told them that the way 
of the transgressor is hard. And he quoted the prophet : 'What 
will you do in the swelling of the Jordan ?' And then he uses the 
words of my text, 'What shall the end be ?' Now there were those 
that did obey. Peter knew their end and you know yours. 'What 
shall the end be to them that obey not God ?' It is to the sinner 
that I preach. A man said : 'I can't be a Christian.' That is not 
true; you can be. If you said: T don't want to be a Christian/ 
I would admire you. But to say that you can't be, that is not 
true. You can be if you want to be. I said that makes God 
out a demon and a tyrant. God requires all men to repent and if 
you don't repent, eternal damnation will be your end. Then you 
say that you can't. Then God knew that you couldn't. Now, if 
God could do a thing like that, God would be unreasonable. God 
knows that all men can repent if they want to; or God would not 
command it. God will not command you to do what you cannot — 
and then damn you in hell because you can't. I won't let anybody 
hurl in God's face that they can't do what God tells them to do. 
If they want to do it, all right. But if you say that you can't, 
then you lie. 

"Now, if I should go up on top of the Millikin building and, 
say to my son William: 'William, fly up there.' 'Papa, I can't.' 
'You can ; if you don't, I will whip you to death.' When I ask 
him to do what I know he couldn't, and told him that I would 
whip him if he didn't, — if I did anything like that as a father, I 
would be just as reasonable as God would be to ask you to do 



360 Life and Labors of 

something you couldn't do, and told you that he would damn you 
if you didn't do it. 

"So Peter said : 'What shall be the end to them that obey not.' 
Some would obey and others not. Some are Christians and others 
not, simply because they don't want to be. So just listen from 
this point of view. 

"In an Ohio town a man said to a minister : 'Here, take that 
letter and open it when you get home.' He did so; and it read: 
'I was at the meeting last night. Somehow the words, 'What shall 
the end be' got a hold on me. They troubled me. And when I 
went home I couldn't sleep or rest, and I awakened my wife and 
went into the library and took down my books of infidels, and 
there was Darwin, and Spencer, and Strauss, and Renan, and 
Voltaire, and Mill, and Tyndall, and Huxley, and Ingersoll — not 
any of them could answer my cry, and satisfy the longing of my 
heart. I turn to you — can you help me?' He found it, where 
every man will find it, down at the cross of Jesus Christ, as a pen- 
itent sinner. 

"And I have been praying that experience for many men here 
tonight. Ever since God saved me and called me to preach, I have 
prayed that he would give me strength to pronounce two words 
in such a way as to startle. One is the word "lost." If I could 
put in it all that it means to you I could lift you off your feet and 
down on your knees. 'Lost.' Ten thousand years from tonight 
we will all be somewhere. Ten thousand times ten thousand 
years and eternity just begun. Increase the multiple and you 
only increase the truth. The other word is 'Eternity.' 'What 
shall the end be?' I pray God to give me some new figure of 
speech tonight, something that I have never thought about. I 
pray God he might impress my mind so I could impress your 
mind, with what I have upon my heart. I pray God that he will 
help me to say, 'I pray God that he will help me to see that I 
in turn may let you see your attitude.' 

"A man came to the Alps and of course had to climb the Mat- 
terhorn. He chose a guide and started out, and came to a place 
where a great canyon 3,000 feet deep, was skirted by a narrow 
ledge of rock scarcely two hands wide. And the man said to the 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday . 361 

guide, ' I never could cross that ; I would lose my mind. I would 
reel and fall to my death.' And the guide laughed him to scorn 
and threw away his alpine stick and shut his eyes, and put his 
hands over his eyes, and with only his feet to follow the ledge and 
balance him, he pushed his way over that yawning abyss to the 
other side, and even a dog, born and raised in the mountains, 
winced and drew back. Yes, your life hangs by a hair's breadth. 

"Listen to me. One single heartbeat may be between you and 
eternal damnation and you sit there with sin written all over you. 
A heartbeat and the hearse will call. A heartbeat and hell and 
damnation are your end. What shall it be to them that obey not 
the gospel of God ? I have never known man or woman who dis- 
believed that you could not classify under one of two headings. 
First, those who, because of utter disregard of God's claims upon 
life have become poltroons, and marplots, and through that dis- 
regard have become scoundrels and have thrown themselves way 
beyond the pale of God's mercy. Second, men and women with 
splendid abilities which they have allowed themselves to become 
absorbed in, and they give the subject of religion even passing 
attention. And they have the audacity to claim for themselves in- 
dividuality superior to those who accept and believe what they 
sneer at, as a dream or a superstition. But you listen to me. If 
you will bring to religion and demand of yourself in religion, the 
same honest research that you demand of yourself in other mat- 
ters, you will know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and the 
Bible the work of God, and you a sinner. In other words, if you 
will demand the same research about eternal things, that you 
demand when you buy a piece of property, when you hire a law- 
yer to see if the title is clear, it won't be long until you know 
where you stand before God. Now, 'What shall the end be to 
them that obey not the gospel?' Well, what is the gospel? Let 
us find out. In the first place, it is glad news. Glad tidings of 
salvation. 

" 'Oh,' said an old skeptic ; 'do you mean to say to me, that the 
news that I will go to hell is good news ?' No ; but if the gospel is 
true, the sooner that you find it out the better it will be for you. 
I don't care whether you call it gospel, prophecy or law. You say 



362 Life and Labors of 

that you are lost ; you are out in a swamp ; that you don't know 
where you are. A man comes to you and says that you are lost. 
That don't meet your condition. But if he says, 'I will guide 
you/ and he helps you back to wife and children, that would meet 
your condition. God does not say simply, that you are 'lost.' 
But God says that you are lost on the road to hell, and 'I have sent 
Jesus Christ, my Son, to lead you out of your lost condition.' 
God informs you of your state and says, 'I want to lead you out 
of it/ That is the good news of the gospel. When Israelites were 
bitten by the serpents in the wilderness, was it not good news that 
Moses raised up a brazen serpent ? And when the world was de- 
stroyed by a flood, was it not good news that Noah would be 
saved. And was it not good news to Rahab, that if she hung the 
scarlet line out of her window, that simply because she had been 
kind to two of God's servants when they were being pursued as 
spies, and took them into her house and covered them over with 
some cord and weeds, and when the pursuers came, not finding 
them, went on and then she lowered them down and God said: 
'When I take the city of Jericho, Rahab, if you will hang the 
scarlet line out of the window, because you treated my servants 
kindly, you and your family shall be spared?' Was it not good 
news for her to know that when the city went down she would 
be saved? 

"Never has such news reached the world as we have it to- 
night. Supposing that you owed $5,000 and had nothing to pay it 
with? And your creditor would seize upon you and put you in 
prison, and while there your son would come and say: 'Father, 
how much is the bill ?' and he would pay it and you would be or- 
dered released. Would not that bring happiness? Listen. We 
were all mortgaged to God, and inflexible justice put us in the 
prison of condemnation. And God looked around to find someone 
to take pity upon us, and His only Son said : 'Father, I will go 
and I will take their nature.' Jesus took our nature, not that of 
devils or angels. For the devils were angels and they rebelled 
and were cast over the battlements of heaven, and paid the pen- 
alty. Jesus took our nature, and when He died on the cross he 
redeemed those whose nature he took. The Devil's first estate 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 363 

was that of purity, but when Jesus died he took our nature, and 
paid the debt of humanity. God gave the Mosaic law and it said : 
'That in the shedding of blood there is the forgiveness of sins/ 
And the high priest took a goat and killed it, and made an atone- 
ment for the sins of the people. Now Jesus Christ came into the 
world and died on the cross. And when He shed His Blood, He 
made an atonement for our sins. If I will accept Jesus, God puts 
it down to my credit ; and I have kept the law. But if man re- 
fuses Jesus, he will be damned as sure as he breathes. No man 
can escape — and there is no appeal from the word of God. It is 
absolutely supreme. There is no appeal. 

"Eternity. The sun is 92,500,000 miles away, and if I could 
charter a fast mail on the Wabash and go fifty miles an hour, it 
would take 212 years to reach the sun. The sun is one of our 
nearest neighbors. In the early morning you will see a bright 
star. Mercury is 91,000,000 miles away and it takes 288 days for 
Mercury to go around the sun. Tomorrow you look in the west 
— you will see a bright star; that is Venus, 160,000,000 miles 
away. It travels around the sun once every 122 days, at a speed 
of 129,000 miles an hour. Here is a red star; it is Mars, and 
Mars is 260,000,000 miles away. It travels around the sun every 
168 days at a speed of 140,000 miles an hour. Who knows but 
tonight that planet is inhabited by a race, which is unsullied by 
sin. The old earth is a planet traveling around the sun once every 
365 days or one calendar year, going at a speed of 68,000 miles 
an hour. Whirling on its axis 19 miles a second, and but for the 
presence of gravitation, this building, you and I, and everything, 
would be flying off in space. Jupiter is the champion star of the 
sky. She is belted around with a row of lights. Jupiter travels 
around the sun once in twelve years, going at the speed of 30,000 
miles an hour. If I wanted to go to Jupiter, I would need some- 
thing faster than an express train, going at the rate of 100 miles 
an hour. If I took a Pullman palace car and tied it to a ray of 
light, (a ray of light travels 192,000 miles per second), if I at- 
tached a Pullman palace car to a ray of light going at the rate 
of 192,000 miles per second, I could go to Jupiter and get back 
tomorrow morning for breakfast at nine o'clock. 



364 Life and Labors of 

"I look away off yonder and see another stupendous old world. 
Saturn is 886,000,000 miles away. She travels around the sun 
once in thirty years, going at the speed of 215,000 miles per hour. 
I guess that is all. And I look and look away off yonder, catch 
a faint glimpse of another faint world, swinging on its tireless, 
prodigious journey. Old Uranus, 1,785,000,000 miles away, trav- 
eling around the sun once in 84 years, going at a speed of 250,000 
miles per hour. I say that is all. I go down yonder and take a 
fast train on the Wabash for Chicago. I jump on to the North- 
western and hurry to Lake Geneva, Wis. I go to the observatory 
and I turn the ponderous telescope and search the sky. Away 
off yonder, out on the frontier of the universe, I catch a faint 
glimpse of another stupendous world. Old Neptune, 2,890,000,000 
miles away, traveling around the sun once in 165 years. If I could 
step on the deck of the battleship Illinois and aim one of the thir- 
teen-inch turret guns at Neptune and fire a projectile, traveling at 
the rate of 1,500 miles a minute, it would be 368 years in reaching 
that planet. 

"Yonder is another star. Hear me. If I could travel 192,000 
miles a second, it would take me three years to reach that planet. 
Yonder is the North Star. If I traveled 192,000 miles a second 
it would take me 45 years to reach that planet. If I could get on 
a railroad going thirty miles an hour it would take me 80,000,000 
years to reach it. If I buy a railroad ticket and pay three cents a 
mile for it, it would cost me $720,000,000 car fare to carry me 
to that planet. 

"Now listen to me. 'Oh, God, what is man, that thou art so 
mindful of him?' I don't believe an infidel ever looked through a 
telescope. I don't believe he ever studied astronomy. He would 
be a fool if he said in his heart, 'there is no God.' He is a fool 
who can look day by day and night by night of the evidence of 
Him and say in his heart, 'there is no God.' Say ! Listen to me. 
There are 1,600,000,000 people on this earth; you are one; I am 
one ; one don't amount to much. You don't know but that there 
are a million other suns like our solar system. If I take 1,600,000,- 
000 and multiply that by 1,400,000,000, multiply that by a million, 
that would be God. If I take an auger and bore a hole in the sun 



Rev. Wm. A. (Billy) Sunday 365 

and pour into the sun 14,000 worlds the size of this one, there 
would be still room around the rim of the sun for a million more. 
God made it all. 

"Say! If ever you appear like an ass it is when you dare say 
you don't believe in God. I can't understand space ; I can't com 
prehend it. 

"Listen to me. The other one is love. God so loved the world 
that He sent His only begotten Son to this sin-cursed world, and 
yet man is indifferent to that love. I can't understand the eternity : 
I can't grasp space. I can't understand how it is you can turn a 
deaf ear to God's love. He is pounding on your heart day after 
day, yet you tramp it beneath your feet. I can't understand it. 
'What shall the end be to them that obey not the gospel of God?' 
What is it not to obey the gospel; what was it to those who 
weren't on the Ark with Noah? They found a watery grave. 
What was the end of those who weren't in the house with Rahab 
when she hung a scarlet line out? What was the end of them? 
'What shall the end be to those who accept not Jesus Christ?' 
They will be lost. 

"I don't care what your present position is, in business, in sci- 
ence, in politics, in philosophy, in culture, in society. I don't 
care a rap about your present. What shall the end be ? That is 
what you are up against. A man said : 'Look here, I don't believe 
there is a literal fire in hell.' 

"What difference does that make? Do you think you can put 
the fire out because you say you don't believe there is one ? Do 
you think that your little, insignificant, infinitesimal manhood 
and womanhood in defiance of God will revolutionize his plan? 
Do you suppose that would make you immune from any punish- 
ment? A fact is a fact whether you believe it or not. Jesus 
- Christ, the Son of God, has said there is a hell. Believe it or not, 
your disbelief won't change it at all, not a bit. 

"Listen to me. Do you think you can frustrate God's plans 
simply by saying you don't believe ? What difference does it make 
to you whether the fire in hell is literal or not ? How do you know 
but what God used fire as an emblem to convey to man his punish- 
ment if he don't repent of his sins? You say you don't believe 



366 Life and Labors of 

the fire in hell is literal. All right; do you think the streets of 
heaven are paved with gold, and do you think that gold is literal ? 
Do you think the gates are of literal pearls? Do you think the 
foundation of the city is of precious stones, rubies, sapphires and 
emeralds? Do you think they are literal or were they only 
emblems? What difference does it make? Does it make any 
difference to me? Yes; you say you believe the gold on the 
streets in heaven is literal, but you don't believe the fire in hell is 
literal. You are a fool. It doesn't make any difference whatever 
hell is or wherever hell is, I have no disposition to go there. I 
don't want you to go. But I will say this much : I am going to 
preach on hell before I am through, several sermons, but I believe 
this, I believe it because the Bible says so. 

"What difference does it make whether the fire is literal or not? 
Hell must be an awful place. If God loved me well enough to 
give Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, up to open up a plan of 
redemption, and to keep you and me out of hell, hell must be an 
awful place. I don't want to go there and I don't want you to 
go. It don't make any difference whether the fire is literal or not." 







FOR BOOKS WRITE 




Herman, Poole & Co. 


Price, 


$1.50 


DECATUR, ILL. 



y 



> ft 












v-> 




V ^ 


<° 






.0 













c 


X 






\ 


^ 










^ x 



r0- '° 



* \^Ws M ^ o 



o 























OO' 










V 



/„ 



a* ^ 






o x 









3*V of 



o 



>° ^ ^ 






v v * ' * ° 




'^ v 



£ ^ 




: : 




<2> 

* * ° f > 









-. ■>£ Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 

- Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
° £\ Treatment Date: Oct. 2005 



^ v# PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 






v v 



3 LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 















r 0' c c 









,0 J 



• I 



j> -^ >■ 



■>* .^ 




& 



< 



& 






•\ 



.#V 



A 






^ ^ 







8 ^ '/;_ 



<T . * / , s A o 



-</> < 



^\# 



r V c°" c « ^ 













■& ^ 









^ 



v 






<?. 



■ * 






. o 




v> 



A* * 


'/- 


*> 


/ s? v 




"xj 


V «/> I 












<3 




«* 



■s:, ,v\ V 



& "^ 



J- Y 



^0 



% 












mm 



m 



